This is Jennifer Gonzalez, welcoming you to episode 247 of the Cult of Pedagogy podcast. In this episode,

we're going to talk about five listening skills that will improve all of your relationships.

The Greatest, The greatest gift you can give another is the purity of your attention.

I want to use this quote, which has been attributed both to Richard Moss and Sir John Templeton, as a starting point for this episode.

Attention has become one of our scarcest resources.

And when I think about all of the relationships we have in our lives,

from the person we buy our coffee from, to our neighbors and coworkers,

to the people we've chosen to spend our lives with,

the quality of those relationships is influenced heavily by the quality of attention we're able to give each other.

And by attention, what I'm primarily talking about here is listening.

This is usually a podcast about teaching for teachers, but this episode really is for anyone, no matter who you are,

because it's information that can help you in just about any area of your life. As a student at Penn State,

I took a three-credit course on counseling skills, a requirement for becoming a campus student

counselor. I had no aspirations to become a professional

therapist, but something about the program appealed to me. So I took the course and became a

counselor for my last two years of college. It was in that course that I learned a set of

listening skills that I have used for over three decades since, specific techniques that

will encourage any person you're talking to

to go a little more in depth, share a little bit more, and most importantly, feel seen,

heard, and understood. These skills can help you as a parent to listen more fully to your child.

They can help you deepen your friendships, communicate better with

your partner, be more present as a daughter or a son, a sister or brother, a colleague, a caretaker,

...