Richard Rohr Quotes

The biggest mistake most people make when it comes to listening is they're so focused on what they're going to say next or how what the other person is saying is going to affect them that they fail to hear what's being said.

I think pastors are the worst listeners. We're so used to speaking, teaching, giving answers. We must learn to be quiet, quit being so verbal, learn to pay attention to what's going on, and listen.

People love to talk but hate to listen.

We should all know this: that listening is not talking; [it] is the gifted and great role and the imaginative role. And the true listener is much more beloved, magnetic than the talker, and he is more effective, and learns more and does more good. And so try listening. Listen to your wife, your husband, your father, your mother, your children, your friends; to those who love you and those who don't, to those who bore you, to your enemies. It will work a small miracle. And perhaps a great one.

Were we as eloquent as angels we still would please people much more by listening rather than talking.

Many people are looking for an ear that will listen. They do not find it among Christians, because these Christians are talking where they should be listening.

Without tact you can learn nothing. Tact teaches you when to be silent. Inquirers who are always questioning never learn anything.

I majored in psychology, and I still love listening to people's problems.

We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak.

Tone is often the most important part of a conversation - and listening is so much more important than what you say.

Keeping one's eyes open, listening, watching, being quiet, adopting some of the techniques of the psychoanalyst in talking to people, will bring you that surface from which something more comes.

It's so easy to butt into a conversation and offer your own thoughts or opinions, but try not to interrupt. Instead, focus on what the other person is saying, think twice and be the person that listens. It's so much more valuable than constantly talking.

If you talk, you only repeat something that you already know. But if you listen, you may learn something that you don't know.

When you know you haven't been connecting with, persuading, or getting through to someone, consciously pause before meeting them and say to yourself, 'During this conversation, I am committing to being present and to connecting.'

I think it is really important that I am always listening.

Listening is terribly important if you want to understand anything about people. You listen to what they say and how they say it, what they share and what they are reticent about, what they tell truthfully and what they lie about, what they hope for and what they fear, what they are proud of, what they are ashamed of. If you don't pay attention to other people, how can you understand their choices through time and how their stories come out?

Listening is everything. Listening is the whole deal. That's what I think. And I mean that in terms of before you work, after you work, in between work, with your children, with your husband, with your friends, with your mother, with your father. It's everything. And it's where you learn everything.

When you listen, you learn, You absorb like a sponge - and your life becomes so much better than when you are just trying to be listened to all the time.

When you know how to listen everyone is the guru

Sometimes listening itself may not be enough-some people must be prodded if you are to find out what they're thinking.

The key ingredient in family communication is listening, really listening.

One of the things I found is that the things we want to say for well-intentioned motives often cause more harm than good. People don't need our words. They mainly need our presence, they need our love. And if you come in too quickly with explanations, you may do more harm than good.

Skillful listening is the best remedy for loneliness, loquaciousness, and laryngitis.

When you speak words that are relevant to people, they automatically shut up and you know you are in the presence of some very magical words. It's a gift when someone can listen and be quiet and not interrupt.

I've learned to listen in all aspects of life, in all relationships and communications. The biggest lesson is to listen.