How To Feel Heard

Today I want to share another tool that can push us in the right direction by allowing the speaker to feel “heard”.

But first, we’ll need a little of Ank’s Theory of Communication.

Ank experiences some external stimulation
Ank has some physical sensations
Ank has a thought (somehow related to 1 and 2)
Ank translates his thought into language
Ank uses his anatomy to make some sounds
The words travel through the air (and other barriers)
You hear the sounds
You translate the sounds you hear into words
You guess what thought I meant by those words
You experience those words as external stimulation

Obviously there’s a lot of gaps in there. I don’t know how all the steps work. But the point, for me, is that there is A Lot of Translation and Interpretation going on.

This is even worse when multiple languages or accents are involved. Half of my conversations with my mom start with confusion because one of us guesses the wrong language when doing the sound -> word translation in Step 8!

Given all the translation and uncertainty, it would be foolish to assume that you’re picking up what I’m putting down when there is any nuance or complexity involved.

This is even worse with emotions because we tend to “constrict” our cognitive capabilities when triggered (fight / flight / freeze / fawn stuff).

Hence all the obsession in our culture with feeling “heard” and “seen”.

One way of short circuiting the confusion is for me to tell you what I just heard so you can verify what I understood is “close enough” to what you were trying to communicate.

Uncle Marshall (NVC) calls this “sayback”.

In mediation world, this is referred to as “reflection”.

Here’s an example from a conference I just went to:

Conference Attendee: “Jed, this is the best organized conference I’ve been to in years. The people you’ve brought together are awesome. You’ve done an incredible job.”

Jed: “I’m glad you’re having a good time.”

Jed’s trying to dodge the compliment. Attendee is not going to feel heard. With compliments it’s not as big a deal as with complaints, but let’s say Attendees cares.

Attendee: “That’s not exactly what I meant.”

Jed: “Oh, sorry, let me try again. This is the best organized conference you’ve been to in a long time. You’re really enjoying the community we brought together and you’re grateful for the work we’ve put into it.”

Attendee: “Totally!”

Notice how this is fundamentally different than:

“Copy that”
“I hear you”
“Heard, chef”
“Got it!”

Those are useful and effective when we can assume that I understood what I heard. They work well for simple orders (“Dice the onions, bro”). But any time there’s room for confusion, projection, or taking things personally, we need more.

Here’s the classic divorce example (which I’ve actually experienced!):

Peter: “Paul never cleans up after himself!”

Mediator/Therapist: “Paul, what did you hear Peter say?”

Paul: “He thinks I’m useless and lazy and I’m sick of all his judgments.”

Obviously, the more you use sayback, the more your life is going to slow down. It’s like a checksum in computer science — you have to trade efficiency for integrity.

Overusing sayback will be very annoying.

But if you feel like you’re not being heard, things are going off the rails, or you’re reacting, it’s Exactly The Tool You’re Looking For.