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                         THE ART OF LISTENING
                                  or
                  SECRETS of BEING a BETTER LISTENER
                                  by
                        Ernest John Rubin, MPS

Some years ago I took a course in public speaking, and to my surprise
I found that one whole section was devoted to the art of listening. I
learned about bad listening habits [there are at least six] as well as
about effective listening [there are four main elements] also about
other significant details such as a 'four word secret'. I found that
listening is a skill that has to be learned just like playing the
piano.

While the course dealt with everyday conversation, lectures, radio,
television, and meetings around a conference table, I realized right
away how important it is to apply that skill to our Masonic
activities.

Assuming that there is nothing wrong with our ears, in other words
that our hearing is normal, how effectively do we really listen?

Most of us are probably too young to remember a broadcast some years
ago, when NBC presented a radio play "Invasion from Mars" with Orson
Welles. At the beginning, during the show, and at the end an announcer
clearly cautioned the listeners that this was a play, and that it was
fictitious. Yet 20 families in a single block in Newark, NJ., rushed
from their homes to escape from what they thought was a gas attack.
Phone lines to radio stations, newspapers, hospitals and police
stations were busy with people asking about 'the invasion'. Orson
Welles and his colleagues had created a panic of national proportions.

How poorly so many Americans listened at that time? But how about more
recently? Research shows that on the average we listen at about 25% of
efficiency.

Some people say: I can sit and look at a person and never hear a word
he is saying. Why? Because most of our formal education is based on
reading and writing, some on speaking, very little on listening, yet
throughout history listening has been the only way of learning;
writing has been with us only a few hundred years. The written word is
slow compared to the spoken word. The world's most important affairs
are decided around the conference table and/or by conference telephone
calls. Flying a plane, just as activities in space ships, depend on
the listening abilities of the ground crew and the pilots.

To be a good listener we must apply certain skills that have to be
learned: studies have shown that listening ability is not dependent on
intelligence that listening ability is not necessarily related to
hearing acuity. We think that we get much practice in listening every
day, and therefore we think that training in this skill is
unnecessary; also, we assume that learning to read will automatically
teach us to listen. Not so! Most of our daily activities and all of
our Masonic doings would be impossible without relying on listening; -
but not many of us realize that a skill is involved in being an
effective listener.

First of all it is good to realize that good listeners regularly try
to think ahead of the talker, try to guess what he is leading up to,
what conclusions could be drawn. If we predict right, we hear the
conclusion twice; if we guess wrong, we instinctively compare the
point we surmised with the actual one made. This constitutes a
learning process recommended by educators since the time of Aristotle.
In other words, listening consists of hearing and interpreting what we
hear.

As good listeners we try to weigh verbal evidence to support the
points we hear.

There are explanations,good ones and bad ones, we should use part of
our thinking time to decide, if the explanations are valid or not.
Next we may hear emotional appeals; they strike at the listeners'
fears, hates, loves or any of his basic instinctive drives; sometimes
this turns into a harangue with names called and abusive language
used. The good listener tries to remain objective and avoid emotional
entanglements. He asks himself."Is there solid evidence mixed with the
speaker's emotional appeal?" We may listen to illustrations. They may
appeal to emotion and reason. Again we should test the validity. Is it
dated?

Does it illustrate the point?'This keeps us on the talker's path.
Periodically we should review the portion of the talk so far. This
improves comprehension and retention. We should listen "between the
lines" for meaning that is not necessarily put into the spoken word;
sometimes that may be more important than what the speaker says.

In other words: we should think ahead, weigh evidence and from time to
time review what has been said.

We can listen even more effectively, if we become aware of words that
upset us emotionally. Some call them "Red Flag Words." Many of our
mental patterns are associated with labels, a word or two. The word
"hometown" usually brings pleasant thoughts. Even if with passing
years the hometown deteriorates, no one can tell us that our hometown
isn't still the best place in the world. We hear the word "hometown"
and we stop listening. No one can tell us about the changes that have
taken place.--

Another example: A firm's accountant drops in to see the general
manager and says: "I have just heard from the Internal Revenue Service
and . . .  "The general manager gets red in the face and thinks: "That
blasted IRS. Can't they leave us alone? Each year the taxes are
higher." The label "IRS' cuts loose emotions that stop the general
manager's listening. In the mean time the accountant goes on to say
that there was a chance for a considerable tax refund by taking proper
steps, but the fuming manager does not hear. -We can analyze the
impact of such words on us by discussing them freely with others. If
we don't, emotions take over again and again, logic is tossed out, and
we don't listen effectively anymore.

How do we cope with emotional filters?

While listening we are bound to be troubled by the very human desire
to hear only what we want to hear and turn off everything we don't
want to hear.

There is a remedy, a four-word secret, and it is not an easy one: HEAR
THE PERSON OUT! We should withhold evaluation using self-control until
the speaker has finished; then review main ideas and assess them. We
should hunt for negative evidence; seek ideas that may prove us wrong
as well as those that might prove us right. This way we miss less of
what people have to say. We should make a critical self analysis: Do
we often feel that the ideas of other people are wrong? When we debate
a point, does it turn out that our argument is almost exactly what the
other person has said? Again, don't forget: Hear the person out! We
should remember at least 6 BAD listening habits:

Bad listening habit No. 1.  Faking attention, - If we are guilty of
that, we only deceive ourselves. We may miss learning something.

Bad listening habit No. 2. "I get the facts listening''. Memorizing
facts is not the way to listen. When people talk, they usually want us
to understand their ideas. Facts are only useful for constructing the
ideas. - Say the speaker talks about facts A to Z; the listener tries
to memorize A; he almost misses B; trying to remember A and B, he
misses C completely and so on.

Bad listening habit No. 3. Avoiding difficult listening 'many of us
have that bad habit. If we don't understand what the speaker is
saying, we turn him off rather than sticking it out, attempting to
understand his words. Gradually we move from easy listening to easier
listening, down and down.

Bad listening habit No. 4: Premature dismissal of subject as
uninteresting. If we make up our mind that this will be uninteresting,
we won't listen. Yet, uninteresting talks may have something worth
listening to. Be selfish and find out whatever idea the speaker may
contribute. Chesterton said once: "There are no such things as
uninteresting subjects; there are only uninterested people."' - -

Bad listening habit No. 5-. Criticizing delivery and physical
appearance:

"Anyone who talks like that, can't have much to say" or "Anyone who
looks like that can't have much to say!" --Remember that content of
message is more important than the form of delivery. - -

Bad listening habit No. 6: Yielding easily to distractions. A noise
coming through the window competes with the speaker: "Too hard to
hear," you say to yourself.

You lean back and turn your thoughts to pleasant things, but remember
it is up to us to mentally shut out the distractions and to turn our
attention to the talker. Listening takes courage:

If we listen thoroughly to someone else's ideas, we might possibly
find that some of our own ideas may be wrong. Lack of courage prevents
us from opening our ears to whatever may be said, from trying to
understand other people's point of view.

So we should take time to listen and to be attentive. Concentration is
difficult, basically because we think faster than we talk. The average
rate of speech for most Americans is around 125 words per minute;
average comprehension is 300 words per minute and more. Slowing down
thought processes is difficult if not painful. In listening there is a
differential between speaking and thought processes; in other words,
we can listen and still have spare time for thinking. What to do with
our spare thinking time as we listen?

The answer to this question holds the key to concentration in
listening. You sit in a restaurant listening to a friend who tells you
about his job. Sounds interesting . . .  you decide to listen to
everything he says. A waiter walks by with a frozen chocolate eclair,
topped with whipped cream. Looks good, you think momentarily, quickly
returning to what your friend is saying. You listen to your friend
again. An eclair with whipped cream is fattening. You find that you
jump back and forth in your thoughts while listening to your friend,
who is still talking about his job. It's only three weeks before
vacation, may be your next enticing thought. I'll be glad to get away.

Suddenly you wake up and tune back to your friend. Did I miss
something? What is he now talking about? The disintegration of your
listening has begun. Listening gets tougher now, so your random
thoughts become more enticing. Eventually you may give up listening
altogether. It is too hard. This business of progressively tuning away
from a talker until we lose his trend of thought is a bad habit that
is quite bothersome.

Critical listening is difficult in contrast to reading. There is the
time-element: the spoken word comes and goes quickly; the written word
can be read and reread over again; also it is harder to be accurate in
conversation than in writing; and from childhood we are motivated to
do things in anticipation of a reward. As listeners we may still think
that the talker will reward us, if we say "yes."

Thus we may accept what we hear.

Increased use of critical listening will produce two results, and this
is important: Life will be easier for those who try to persuade us to
do something for our own good and for-that of our fellow men: but
those who use oral persuasion for fewer honorable reasons will find
the task increasingly difficult.

Before closing let me report to you how instructors teach listening.
It involves four main elements; they suggest:

1. Try to concentrate on the speaker; this will improve your listening
   ability.

Telephone operators and talk-show hosts for instance, have to be acute
listeners or they would not be kept on the job.

2. Listen to the quality of a voice; you'll like some and don't like
   others.

3. Listen to sounds other than talk; see what sounds you like over
   others.

4. Listen to spoken words: tapes, records, radio; evaluate what you
   hear.

There is an art in listening: to listen effectively we should abandon
all prejudices and preformulations (very important for Masons). If we
have a receptive state of mind, things can be understood easily.
Unfortunately many of us listen with resistance. We are screened with
prejudices, whether religious or spiritual, psychological or
scientific, or with our daily worries, desires and fears. Therefore we
really listen to our own noise; we listen to our own sound; we don't
listen to what is being said. It is extremely difficult to put aside
our training, our inclinations, our resistance. Some of us lack
concentration: we watch TV, read, talk, smoke and drink, all at the
same time. In order to concentrate fully on listening we should be
patient with ourselves. It is not easy to give full attention to the
situation at hand, to learn to live fully in the present and to
evaluate things as they are. We become better listeners and give our
lives constructive and purposeful meaning, if we talk simply and
understand clearly. The ear plays a double role: as a receiver of
sound and as a perceiver of words and situations. Listening is a
social activity. If we can relax and arrive at a free verbal exchange,
productivity reaches its highest peak. We learn from each other and
arrive at a new level of mutual and truthful communication. Since
speech is the essential means of communication, mutual understanding
must depend on shared meanings and experiences. A message can only be
understood, if there is an overlapping experience between sender and
receiver. A sense of mutual understanding will develop by more
effective listening. We have to be eager to affirm the integrity of
the others by evaluating what they say. Teaching attentive listening
has been the secret of our forefathers: For many years the Masonic
candidate had to rely on his coach for oral instruction, thereby
learning and memorizing his work.

It follows that well learned listening habits are of great benefit to
us in the Lodge as well as in our daily life. Let me finish this
little discussion with a short item that came to me from our State
Department of Higher Education in Salem. It had to do with Halley's
comet a few years ago, and memos were dictated over the phone,
starting, with the Superintendent of Schools to the Assistant
Superintendent:


AUG. 8, 1994

A PLAY ON COMMUNICATION

(A Hypothetical Case):
Note: All memos dictated over the phone.

from Superintendent of Schools to Assistant Superintendent:

Next Thursday at 10:30 Halley's Comet will appear over this area. This
is an event that occurs only once every 75 years. - Call the school
principals and have them assemble their teachers and classes on the
athletic field and explain this phenomenon to them. If it rains then
cancel the day's observation and have the classes meet in the
auditorium to see a film about the comet.

from Assistant Superintendent to School Principals:

By order of the Superintendent of Schools next Thursday at 10:30
Halley's Comet will appear over the athletic field. If it rains then
cancel the day's classes and report to the auditorium with your
teachers and students where you will show films, a phenomenal event
which occurs every 75 years.

from School Principals to Teachers:

By order of the phenomenal Superintendent of Schools at 10:30 next
Thursday Halley's Comet will appear in the auditorium. In case of rain
over the athletic field the Superintendent will give another order,
something which occurs only every 75 years.

ANNOUNCEMENT from Teachers to Students:

Next Thursday at 10:30 the Superintendent of Schools will appear in
our school auditorium with Halley's Comet, something which occurs
every 75 years. If it rains, the Superintendent will cancel the Comet
and order us all out to our phenomenal athletic field.

NOTE from Students to Parents:

When it rains next Thursday at 10:30 over the school athletic field
the phenomenal 75 year old Superintendent of Schools will cancel all
the classes and appear before the whole school in the auditorium
accompanied by Bill HALLEY and the Comet.

POSTSCRIPT from Parents to Parents:

What's going on there anyway?