Perspectives & Listening : Most, if not all, of the things we know are as a result of the data we’ve gathered through our five sense organs.
You would attest to the fact that no one else on earth has heard exactly all the things you’ve heard, seen exactly all the things you’ve seen, tasted exactly all things you’ve tasted, smelled exactly all the things you’ve smelled, and have touched and felt the same things you’ve touched and felt. That is just impossible. Thus, there are over seven billion perspectives
of the world.
I love to put it this way: there are over seven billion worlds in one world.
In the absence of law, morality, or any other precept, everyone is right.
If we could analyze the behavior of everyone through their point of view, we would have understood why people act the way they do, although those behaviors may be unlawful or immoral.
Unfortunately, most people tend to interpret things from their own perspective only.
This is an appalling phenomenon as you are insinuating that aside from you, no one else matters.
A quintessential of this fallacy would be arguing that your view from the angle you are standing in a room is how the room looks for you and everyone else in the room. Meanwhile, there are other people in the room viewing the same room from different angles!
If you realize your perspective is only yours and, as such, everyone has his or hers, you can’t do anything but listen.
I mean listen like you know nothing; at least, you don’t know the person’s point of view. So just listen! The only way you can truly understand someone is to listen to the person.
You are you, so if you want to know someone or understand the behavior of someone, listen to the person.
Listening is a skill, and like any other skill, it needs to be developed through practice. Usually, people think they can naturally listen because they can hear.
Listening first of all requires the listener to appreciate different perspectives and be willing to learn. If you think you know it all, you can’t listen.
In fact, we are all learning! Our minds often play tricks on us when we are listening; it mostly selects one theme and
pulls out any related data it can find in its memory, hence distracting you.
This impedes your ability to fully listen and your interpretation ends up being biased, as you would be holding on to that particular theme while the speaker continues.
Like with any other skill, it takes time and effort to master listening.
Everyone wants to talk, if you could just listen, you can learn from thousands of perspectives