No point in talking when no one is listening

Are you listening to me?

I remember a song years ago from Rod Stewart about young love.

In the song he sings about 2 young people in love who take off on the open road to try to find their future.

But one of the lines in the song explains everything..

“Billy wrote a letter back home to Patti’s parents tryin’ to explain.

He said we’re both real sorry that it had to turn out this way.

But there ain’t no point in talking when there’s nobody list’ning so we just ran away

Patti gave birth to a ten pound baby boy, yeah!”

Let me state here that I do not agree with the song as a lifestyle… But the “where Billy wrote the letter” rings true.

2 young people were trying to be heard, they were trying to be validated…

But there was no one listening there was no validation of their thoughts and emotions.

The difficulties that so many couples have is that there is no one listening.

People tend to think that if somebody doesn’t agree with what they say then they are not being heard.

It seems that in the song Billy and Patty we’re trying to get their point across,

they were trying to be heard but nobody was there to listen, to validate their feelings.

How to validate a person when you do not agree with what they are saying.

So the question is how do you validate a person if you don’t agree with them?

When somebody is talking, when they want to be validated… The best thing to do is listen to them without interruption.

2. Listen very closely to what they are saying even if you don’t agree with it.

3. There may be some points in their conversation that you can work with.

4. The point is listen to them until they are done talking.

If you simply cannot agree with what they are saying your response could be something like this…

“ I understand what you are saying ( Then repeat what they have said so they will know that you heard them)

Then say “I understand what you are saying but I just can’t agree with it.

It doesn’t mean that I love you any less it just means that I can’t agree with what you are saying”

I am not saying that this will “fix” the situation…

But the person that you are talking too well know that you are listening to them.

If you would like to know how to take this further… give us a call

Christian Counselors in Fort Worth Texas

700 N. E. Loop 820 Suite 200 B
Hurst, Texas 76053
Phone: (817) 898-0490