What does it mean to be heard deeply and how can you ask for it?

Deeply meeting someone's need to be heard goes beyond hearing the content of what is said. Intuitively, you know this. You know that being heard deeply is incredibly supportive and nourishing. It makes sense then, that you would like to create this more often with the people closest to you. Let’s take a look at a few of the central ingredients of being heard deeply and how you might ask for and create this in your most important relationships.

When someone really "gets you," a lot is happening all at once. They let their heart be affected by you. They allow themselves to feel their own caring, grief, joy, or fear while all the while giving you their full attention. Attending to you in this way, it's almost as if they can follow your perception of something, see how it moves through you and how it touches you. They can set aside what matters to them long enough to connect with what matters to you. They see what lights you up even though you imagine you don't show it. With a quiet confidence, they don't have to fit your experience into their own view or related experience. They can make guesses about subtle aspects of your experience. They can ask questions that deepen your connection with yourself. They can just hang out in your world with curiosity, compassion, and delight in knowing you. In a precious moment of being heard deeply, all this comes together and you are nourished.  

This level of listening may seem almost magical when you experience it. At the same time, it is something that can be cultivated and requested. Five aspects are helpful to consider in this endeavor; context, self-connection, autonomy, security, and specific requests. 

1. Context

   • When something is very alive for you, you might feel a sense of urgency to express it, or at the other end of the continuum, a desire to protect vulnerability by keeping it private. Both of these impulses interfere with your ability to discern whether or not the present context will support you being heard. Noticing whether a particular moment will support you being heard is a way of honoring yourself and what you have to share. Here are few questions that can help you discern whether or not the present moment context is supportive:

     • Is the physical environment quiet and predictable enough to allow focus and presence?

     • Does the level of privacy in the environment match the level of privacy that would help you feel comfortable sharing?

     • Are physical needs met in the moment for you and the other person? 

2. Self-connection

   • The experience of being heard deeply can only occur when you are willing and able to stay with yourself and your experience. This requires you to: 

     • Hold yourself as worthy of taking up space and the other person’s attention.

     • Find willingness to risk greater intimacy. 

     • Sort various aspects of experience such as body sensations, feelings, needs, and thoughts.

3. Autonomy

   • Good listeners are listeners who choose to listen. You care for the other person and yourself when you take the time to honor choice. This means asking the other person if they are willing to listen in a way that goes beyond polite ritual. First, when you ask, make sure you wait for the response. This may seem like an obvious step, but I am a bit surprised at how often I see people ask, and then jump right into their expression without really noticing if the person answered or not.

   • Second, double check.  Ask a second time if they are really up for listening and let your potential listener know that you don't have to share what's on your mind at that moment. Tell them you can wait if this isn't a good time. Let them know that what you want to share is important to you so you want to make sure that they can give their full energy and attention.

4. Security

   • To the extent that emotional security is present in the relationship, listening and a sense of being heard deeply is easier. If everything else I've named, is accessible then this may be where a barrier exists. You can learn more about cultivating emotional security in this eight week course. Emotional security both within yourself and within a particular relationship is often the focus of work with a therapist.

5. Specific requests

   • As someone who wants to be heard deeply it is your responsibility to know what contributes to that for you. Perhaps the most enjoyable way to learn this about yourself is to reflect on moments when you have been heard deeply and name everything that contributed to that experience. Knowing yourself in this way, you can make specific and doable requests. Here are a few possibilities: 

• I wonder if you could ask me some questions that would help you connect with my experience?

• Could we slow down? I want to notice what else is coming up about this. 

• Would you be willing to let go of attempting to understand the reasons for my feelings and rest your attention in your heart?

• Would you be willing to say back what you really get about my experience?

• Would you be willing to take a moment and imagine you are me in the experience I am sharing and tell me what you notice?

• Would you be willing to offer some empathy guesses?

As you engage in this practice of listening and being heard deeply, it’s perhaps most important to remember that meeting someone exactly where they are is a powerful contribution. Imagining you must fix, heal, know something more, or do something more is often a distraction from the healing power of being deeply present with another in honor and acceptance.

Practice

Take a moment now to reflect on the specific doable requests given above.  Is there one you would like to make of someone close to you the next time you want to be heard?