I don't always listen. To others. To myself. I can always hear--sounds, vibrations of cilia translated into meaning and that meaning being what I hear. And hearing is easy. To me, hearing is emotionless, is doesn't bind me to an emotion and it is passive.
But hearing and listening are different.
Listening is my ears, my thoughts, my eyes, my heart. Listening is my anxiety. It binds me to action. I am bound to invest myself in a problem which may have no solution. I am bound to giving part of myself to another.
And this is hard...
...rewarding...
...and how I learn.
I am angst-ridden and always learning how to calm myself down. I was once told that "When [I] walk into a room the stress level goes from here [hand down low] to here [hand goes way up]."
Here's the cliff-notes version of what went through my head:
1. *shock* "What did I do?"
2. *pain* "Ouch, that cut deep."
3. *anger* "I feel attacked."
*sensory overload*
So I chose to just hear the comment. That is how I deal with my pain: I run away. I don't hide but I frost over. I jokingly refer to myself as the ice queen because I frost over and don't feel anything when everything's too much to feel.
But then I listened to that comment. I realized my stressed-out self doesn't always come across as well "hidden" as I initially thought. I'm still learning how to make myself a stress-free person to be around. I have found one of a myriad of answers: I can be one who listens.
I learn through listening. Hearing is the beginning. I ask myself: Who did you listen to today?
