Seek first to understand, then to be understood

I think that this habit was custom written for me.  I think it might come from growing up with a bunch of lawyers in my family, but I have to "win" every conversation; because I am, obviously, always correct.  If we look at the habit of, "think win-win," from last week, we know that one sided victories are not good, especially for education.  We need to focus on finding the middle road to take.

I put the quote from Mr. Churchill at the front of this post, it is the same one I used last week.  As we explore the habits of interdependence, how we communicate and interact with others becomes important.  I don't like it when people don't listen to what I am saying, or when they try to minimize any struggles that I have.  One of my least favorite retorts I get is similar to, "Oh, yeah, I went through that, it was pretty bad, but I'm ok now."  In one sentence they took the focus from me trying to cope with a situation, and turned it back to a story about themselves, leaving me left searching for support.  They did not listen to understand what I was saying.

As I work with my colleague on this habit, we noticed how difficulty it is going to be for both of us.  She and I are type, "A" personalities to the extreme.  We don't like to take the time to process what someone is truly saying.  We immediately respond.  The way I presented a solution was to focus on our interactions with our students.  After a student asks a question that we think is off topic, or a "bad" question, we will take a count of 10 to really think about how the student could have come up with the question.  Perhaps it is a clarity issue?  Perhaps they weren't paying attention?  Sometimes we are not really sure where students come up with their questions, but is we seek first to understand, then we can be understood by our students.

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