Listen, Respect & Learn

He listened to
The heavens roar, the earth quake,
The wind blow, the leaves shake,
And then the voice of his Creator,
“Wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be righteous?”
Then learnt and fathomed he his wrong.
Job repented in dust and ashes.

Today the message is very simple and straight. Listen, respect and learn.

Let’s start with this article itself. I’m not going to be quoting any fancy examples or bringing out any deep thoughts from the scriptures. Still, however plain, long, boring and familiar it may look, read on, listen on.

We need to listen! That’s the first thing we need to learn. There is so much talking and noise around the world. Everyone wants to talk and make their point be heard across, we not being excluded. We may have so many better stories to share, could be better gifted to expound from the scriptures, may have better solutions to a problem or we may be gray haired which in itself explains a lot. Still, listen.

It takes efforts to listen to the other person and their opinions. Sometimes, it might even call for some amount of sacrifice. On the other hand, that someone might not have anything big or important to share or that something may not even appeal to you taste. So what? Listen. By doing this you show that you respect them. Respect and patiently listen to others and their opinion because there will definitely be something you can learn through it. Further, listen and don’t just hear. We can hear things and shove it out through the other ear. But listen patiently! Take a step ahead and think over what you hear.

Respect the person irrespective of age or qualification and appreciate what the other person’s got to say even though they be advices. Advices are the hardest things to listen to, keep aside respect. And advices from a person who hardly knows anything what we are going through, is bitter. Advices from whomever it may come, listen, respect and learn something from it. Oh, yes, it’s difficult to respect what we listen.

You know, we human beings are very selfish. We all the time are looking out for things that please us, things that we need, things that can benefit us. We spend a lot of time thinking about ourselves, thinking about our problems and worries. But would we stop and look around? Look at the world we live in, the so many people that we come across everyday. Look at the so many things happening day in-and-out around us, and listen.

Listen to what the people got to say; listen to what the world is crying out for; listen to the problems that the people are facing. Listen! There are so many lessons to learn from the things around us. Give them some time and listen to them, and they will listen to you and respect you. Not only will they respect you, but you will also learn a lot from them and about them. We miss out on so many things that make life beautiful, just because we are so selfish and don’t listen.

One of the greatest things that keep us from practicing this is the ‘I know it all’ attitude. You may have skipped many lines above maybe because there wouldn’t have been anything much to learn or you would have read something like that before. So what if you read it again? So what if you hear that same old message again? There certainly will be something for you to learn.

The ‘I know it all’ attitude or problem comes basically because of pride. It’s hard to accept this. But here is where I wish to stress. After being in this similar ‘I know it all’ problem, I’ve realized that this is a very important thing to practice to come out of it. Sometimes we claim we know everything, all the rights and wrongs, all the problems that we are facing, the best solutions to go about a problem and we don’t give any much value to what the other person got to say. Hey, please keep the ego aside, and learn to listen, respect and learn from every opinion and from every person.

Listen to others and don’t disregard certain people because of some pre-formed notions that we have of them. We tend to ignore old people because of their monotony or their old-style talks and practices. But there’s a lot to learn from them, through their testimony and years of experience. Listen and respect because it might be something that’s going to help you a long way ahead and make you wise someday.

Let me sum it up with this verse:

A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels. (Pro 1:5)