Sometimes this difference is not even substantive. Sometimes it is a shift internally that the listener cannot see, but the thinker can feel. Sometimes it is a new emotional relationship with the thought.
So I have become impressed by those thinker-ârepetitionâ moments, now understanding that, yes, it matters what the thinker says, but it matters more what happens for them because they say it.
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I have said that we have also very recently begun to understand that the mind seems to think in âwaves and pausesâ, not in âpartsâ. (Formerly I thought the road to the incisive question consisted of âpartsâ and could be mapped. I was wrong. The mind is not so predictably linear.) It then determines in the pause the âjust rightâ question among those âinnate questionsâ to generate a new wave. As the listener, we are now able to navigate that same âpauseâ process to determine the right question when the person cannot do it for themselves.
I interrupt. And when I do, it trumpets: âI am better than you. I matter more.â It has to mean I do not see you as my equal. Why else would I interrupt you?
I think we have to face it: to interrupt we first must abandon equality. We
must first assume that no matter what the person is saying, no matter what they are thinking, no matter what they are about to think, what we want to say is more valuable and in that moment we matter more than they do. Weâre better.
And get this nuance: we are not assuming just that our idea is better; it well may be. We are assuming that deep down we deserve more than they do to speak right this second. If we didnât assume that, we would listen. We would not speak until they had finished their thought. We would even stay interested in where they would go next, and where they would end up.
Difference is often so deeply threatening we cannot bear to listen to it. Much less embrace it. We cannot bear to imagine that we might be wrong and they might be right and, heaven forbid, at least as good in every way as we are. Or better.
The culprit here is an unavoidable sequence of childhood. When people are brought up to fear difference, especially difference of thought, they are easier to control. And society adores control.
To think afresh about an issue by listening with interest to an extreme opposing view feels, therefore, like risking personal annihilation. This assumption of âcore differenceâ is nothing less than the fear of ceasing to be.
We also have seen the power of repeating a question. And we know about the importance of using the thinkerâs own words if we refer to their thinking. People think in their own specific words, not just in their own language.