Seen: Healing Despair and Anxiety Through Connection Sample

Just Listen

Listening to someone who is hurting is an act of love. Listening communicates, “I see you because I hear you.” It communicates a sense of safety. Keep in mind that good listening is not just hearing someone, it’s helping someone who is hurting to emotionally exhale.

Have you ever just needed to vent? If so, then you have emotionally exhaled. To emotionally exhale means to acknowledge feelings and move them from the right side of our brains to the left side, where they can be processed.

The right side of the brain can build up a lot of anxiety and fear. When we help someone to emotionally exhale, we are helping them to acknowledge the feeling and move it to the left side of the brain, our logical processing. To logically process emotions is to examine the emotion with truth, faith, and principles. But first, it must be acknowledged or “exhaled.”

I love how Jesus responded to people. He would often ask more questions, rather than just give statements. In John chapter 4, we see this example of Jesus listening. A woman who was hurting at a well. It was about noon, a time when most had already gathered their water for the day. But one woman came to the well. It’s thought that she came to the well at mid-day to avoid the chatter of judgmental village people. Her lifestyle, and the choices she made, left her feeling shame and judgment from others.

But not Jesus.

He began to have a conversation with her at the well. Culturally, it was not acceptable for a Jewish man to speak to, or even give notice to, a Samaritan woman. But Jesus was no ordinary Jewish man. He showed up, He saw her, and He listened. Their conversation indicated what Jesus already knew about her, but he took His time listening and conversing. Think about it, Jesus knowing all things, could have just started telling the woman all that He knew about her from the start. But He didn’t, He listened to her and connected with her through conversation.

As you help others to emotionally exhale, ask them, “How do you feel?” Allow them time to share and ask questions that keep the conversation going. Use statements like, “I can see that you feel…” or “Tell me more.” These statements help cue the other person that you’re interested in listening and give space for an emotional exhale.