Effective listening is a skill that underpins all positive human relationships. It is not a passive task, and it is not something many of us are naturally good at.

But most of us know the power of being really listened to – of knowing we have been heard, understood, and accepted. We have experienced the relief of it, the deep sense that although nothing has changed circumstantially, something has shifted, and the burden we felt is now lighter.

In our mentor training we practice active listening, and mentors are often surprised by the way it makes them feel, and how much it deepens relationships quickly.

So how can we listen better?

You may have heard it said that active listening is about staying engaged, about eye contact and reading body language, about not interrupting and giving the speaker space. All these things are good, but these skills don’t go far enough. They don’t get to the heart.

Ultimately, when we listen we should be seeking to understand. Not to understand the facts or circumstances primarily, but to understand the speaker’s perspective, their experience, to understand what it is to see and feel the world in their shoes.

So we need to learn to listen for meaning – beyond the words – into the facial expression, the tone, the rhythm. We listen to the emotions, to what’s happening beneath the surface even as they speak. We lean in, we give space, we are patient as they figure out what they want to voice and how to do it.

And as we hear the meaning and begin to understand from their perspective, we can let the speaker know they are heard and understood by validating what they are saying. We might name an emotion they are feeling, and the scale of it, we might tell them we get it and paraphrase something pertinent they have said, so they know it’s been received.

In Shirley Pastiroff’s book, The Mindful Parent, as adults listen to children – whether toddlers or teenagers, readers are encouraged to:

• Mirror- state the emotions they see or are being told about
• Link – state that it makes sense that the child is feeling like this because of specific things in their background, character or memories, and then
• Pause – and sometimes the simplest thing is the hardest. But it’s also the most powerful. Nothing says ‘I see you and accept you’ like that pause.

And this isn’t just for adult/child relationships. In my couples counselling, I often train people to listen better and to let their partner know they have really heard. Sometimes we are good listening, but we’re not great at letting the other person know what they have said has landed.

For to realise the full benefits of listening well, we need not only to understand, but to let the speaker know that we really get it. We must feel with them, and communicate that empathy. Whether in words, or a pause, a loving look, or our own tears, we need to let the speaker know that they have been understood, that what they have shared has been received. It is then that the power of listening is truly harnessed, and we feel held, secure in the knowledge that someone is with us, and we are not alone.

About the author

Alison Taylor is the Mentor Coordinator at Concrete Rose. She is a counsellor with a special interest in trauma, and runs her own private practice, House of Restoration Counselling. She and her family have fostered two children and she is passionate about building better outcomes for children and young people who have had a traumatic past. A graduate of Cambridge University herself, she now enjoys working with students who are care leavers or estranged from their parents. She is responsible for recruiting and training mentors and building relationships with colleges, all with a view to helping our students thrive at university and build the foundations for a successful future.