I’ve always thought of myself as the quiet type—the guy at the corner table, nursing his bourbon and watching the world go by, wry commentary running through his head. The guy who lives by Lao Tzu’s dictum that those who know do not speak, while those who speak do not know.

And I’ve been that guy. Sort of. I probably still am, on those rare occasions when I find myself entirely alone. But that wry, running commentary? It’s not exactly quiet. And it never ends. So…do you really qualify as one of “those who do not speak” if you can’t stop speaking to yourself?

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I’ve tried meditation a few times, and I’ve never gotten the hang of it. It’s a shame. Emptying my mind seems like it would be a great idea in theory, because man, does it get noisy up in here.

Put the inner monologue to the side for a moment. There’s usually a piece of music running on a loop in my head. Sometimes it’s a theme from a piece of classical music (lately it’s been a couple of minutes of Beethoven’s 7th Symphony, first movement); sometimes it’s a song I love. Sometimes it’s a song I hate, which is really annoying and very hard to get rid of. Whatever it might be, if I’m not engaged in active conversation with someone, there’s usually some kind of tune playing in my head.

Unless I’m listening to actual music in the room, which I’m doing more and more frequently because of my tinnitus. More noise in the head-bone.

And, as I mentioned, if I’m not talking to people in person or on Zoom or on Teams, I’m talking to myself—that running internal monologue that, I was surprised to learn, not everybody has.

I’ve always thought of myself as a good listener, but…I don’t know. How much can I really be paying attention to you if I’m constantly talking to myself?

I was thinking about all of this recently because our little division within my company needs to plan some sales training in a few months, and one of the topics we wanted to spend time on was consultative listening—the need to listen to the customer, ask them questions, explore their problems, and only then start to offer solutions (rather than banging on the door and telling them what a great vacuum cleaner you’re selling…metaphorically speaking).

I remember being in discussions like this 20 years ago at another company. I was leading a curriculum team, and my project managers were going to have to go out in the field to work with focus groups and content review teams at school districts. My folks were all former classroom teachers; they had no experience representing the project requirements and deadlines of a company to a client, or the concerns of a client back to the company. So, we were invited to sit in on a training with the sales team, and this idea of consultative listening was exactly what we were taught.

They gave us an acronym to use, which I remember to this day: LAER, for Listen, Acknowledge, Explore, and Respond. We learned it, we practiced it, and we got a lot of humiliating feedback—because all of us tried to get to Respond too fast. We so desperately wanted to be of use, to be helpful, to be problem-solvers. But we had to learn to back off, to ask questions, to listen, and then to ask more questions.

You might think that former classroom teachers would be well positioned to be good questioners and good listeners, but it’s not always the case. We often default to talking—partly because we think it’s our job to impart wisdom (cover that curriculum!), and partly to fill the void when all we’re met with is blank stares.

Even when we shut up and listen to a student answer a question, we’re often not listening to them—not really. We’re just waiting for the correct answer that we already know. If we don’t hear it, we move on to the next kid. We may not have actually heard what that first student said.

We could pause. We should pause. We could acknowledge (“what I hear you saying is…”, and we could explore (“how did you come up with that answer?”). We would learn a lot about how our students are thinking, and why they make the mistakes they do. We’d be better teachers if we were better learners—if we were better students of who our students were.

The importance of listening is pretty central to my ethnic/religious/cultural background. The most important daily prayer in Judaism starts with, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.” LISTEN UP, PEOPLE!

Throughout the Hebrew Bible, God is always heard, never seen. A voice speaks out of a burning bush, or a voice thunders out the law from the top of Mount Sinai (and frightens everyone back to their tents), or a voice whispers prophecy to those who are able to hear it:

But the Lord was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake: And after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.

(1 Kings 19:11)

Which is all kind of funny, since one thing we modern Jews are famous for, at least in this country, is never shutting up. We interrupt each other (and innocent bystanders) constantly, and we don’t even do it to be rude. It’s so common a thing that it has a name: Cooperative overlapping.

Let me tell you, there’s not much room for a still, small voice when my cousins get together.

Other folks may not interrupt each other vocally, but we’re all checking out of conversations, these days, by looking at our phones “just for a sec.” We get a beep, and we need to check a text. Or look at one little TikTok that someone sent us. But it’s never just a sec, and it’s never just one video, and once we start scrolling, we’ve lost all sense of time, and the world continues turning around us.

With the constant yammer of social media, you’d think we’d be better readers and listeners. There’s so much to read and listen to, now! But somehow, the more stuff there is out there, the more rigid our biases and preconceptions seem to become. The arrow of science starts with gathering evidence and ends with forming a theory, but the arrow of 21st century America seems to start with theory and then go searching for confirming evidence.

I am trying to do better. I am trying to hear more voices and let them have some space in my crowded head, even if I disagree with them. Even if some of them are scary. I want to understand. I can’t be of use to anyone—or myself—if I can’t understand.

I am trying to shut up the inner monologue and be more present among the people I care about. It’s always better. There is nothing I love as much as being at that corner table with friends, cooperatively overlapping with stories and laughter and memories.

Come find me there and tell me how you’re doing. I’ll listen.

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