Unseen

Yesterday a friend of mine lamented that she felt unseen by her husband. His response to her mentioning an ailment or issue or discomfort was to cover over her voice loudly with his own pain. I could only nod in sad recognition of having these kinds of relationships in my own life. Some people weigh heavily on the narcissist scale. Some people have not been self-reflective enough to understand the pain this kind of expression causes to other people. But honestly, we have all done it. We have become triggered in our own pain upon hearing about someone else’s. We have used our own issues as a weapon to deflect any responsibility for someone else’s problems.

We’ve all heard it said that it is better to be a good listener. My true confession is that I bristle every time I hear that said. Listening is not a thing! I have things to say! I am a person of action. Listening is not an action. It is a passive activity and good listeners are namby-pamby and not up for actually fixing anything. There. I said it. Except that when we don’t actually listen, we don’t fill our brains with anything new. We don’t fuel the fire that might go to improving ourselves or our relationships or helping other people. Listening is like eating well or getting good sleep, or reading, or taking our meds, or exercise. Without those things, we become unraveled. We stop going. Things fall apart.

My friend worries that the longer she is invisible to her husband the less likely their relationship will make it. Her partner is running out of the fuel that he needs to help make the relationship work. As for me, I’m taking the “be a good listener” out of the passive category and putting it into the action category. Because fire is action. I will fuel my brain. I will make my smoothie, get on my yoga mat, and fucking listen when my people are speaking to me.