Why Quiet Listening is Important Action
Do you too feel it—the disorienting internal pressure we experience in social-media-soaked times to say something about terrible events? Human motivations being what they are, I believe this internal pressure is gray-tinged: neither fully concerned for others or fully ego-driven. Most commonly, we find ourselves between this black/white dichotomy. And most events are themselves more pallid gray than black and white, involving complicated situations and flawed human actors. Even something as formerly non-complex as a natural disaster is now, in light of climate change, complexified, inviting us to construct personal commentaries around tragic weather events.
The notion that “silence is complicity” can be used to bully people, forcing people to choose speech over listening. As though more speaking will solve complex problems or mend our breaking hearts. As though open-hearted listening is a moral failure. But open-hearted listening along with practicing discernment amid floods of disinformation and hate mongering, may be the most important thing we do in these times. Listening and more listening. In fact, proof of listening’s importance might be found in considering its absence. Are endless talk and opinion-stating, the choirs of chatter from every corner, making us more empathetic and just? … {Read remainder of column on Patheos HERE.}