Little Book of Listening

The Little Book of Listening is an introduction to and practical guide for listening as an emergent strategy for creating a transformed world. It presents radical listening as an essential macro-skill, one that is essential in forming “right relationships” with ourselves and others that are the necessary prerequisite to all lasting forms of social change.

This is a collaborative book, constructed from the contributions of twenty-six listeners from a wide variety of backgrounds who have shared their strategies, experiences, inspiration, and hopes for a transformed world through listening justly and equitably. One of the primary goals of the book is to offer practical tools for readers to develop the skills to listen to themselves and others more effectively, drawing attention to the barriers and filters that so often distract us from listening. Another goal is to inspire readers through the personal stories of how just listening has impacted the authors and invite readers to adopt these approaches themselves. Finally, we aim for this text to be a resource for practitioners in the fields of justicebuilding and peacebuilding.

Conversations are how humans explore new ideas and reach new understandings: paradigms shift and the world is changed by our communication with each other. Whatever processes are used, it is imperative that facilitators and participants listen deeply, humbly, and attentively, without ego or agenda, to themselves and to one another.

Reviews:

I found this book to be a helpful addition to my collection of books to help me become more of who I hope to be. It is short enough to not feel like one is getting bogged down in a “self-help” book, yet concise enough to remind us of some of the things we already know but do not practice: primarily true awareness and genuine presence to another, to their life, to their story. We all wish to do that and be that. Sometimes we delude ourselves to thinking we actually do that, yet it isn’t always easy. (Especially for those of us who like to “help” or “fix” the problems of others. “The Little Book of Listening” is sort of a handbook, a reminder to refer to. I especially appreciated the the testimonials interspersed throughout the book, touching reminders of the validity of the healing practice of listening. It is deeply comforting to know that listening, just and simply listening, is a radical act of, in a hard world, resistence. Then, ultimately, healing and transformation. (Amazon reviewer, 2023)

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