We live in a society where speaking is a common ritual than listening. We are always up for critics, judgements, and counting flaws but are mostly passive in appreciating, promoting, and letting others live the way they want to.
In this advanced era, we are inclined towards giving our views instead of listening to others’ opinions, giving value to it, and keeping the fact in mind that it’s not compulsory to agree with one’s point of view by hook or by crook. We don’t feel the urge of sitting silently and listening to other’s problems, to give a shoulder to cry on, or to give a sincere hand to clutch to make someone rise when they fall. Instead, we start talking about our own problems until the other person doesn’t feel a pang of guilt.
In this hustling and bustling era, if we start to be a listener many of our problems could be solved after a mutual discussion. There wouldn’t be people suffering in silence alone, quelling their voices within themselves, and being a target of ultimate depression and other mental health problems, which could lead to suicidal thoughts and immediately fatal. Even in the times of vast development and technology, we are still backward mentally that today consulting a psychologist is considered as “mental retardants” and is labeled as mad. Even though that person isn’t insane but exhausted to keep his silence within himself.
A listener could not specifically be a psychologist. He could be anyone from your best friend to your family to your colleague or even your closest relative. Indeed, the best of the listeners is Allah Almighty, but being a mortal earthling, we seek for people to listen to us without judging. Even the listener is confined to make the speaker assertive that he isn’t vain and is here for a purpose. How can we comfort people with words? That’s a question that comes across many minds. Just listen to them quietly, once they are done give them a tight hug and tell them what wonders they can do. It works as a MAGIC! The habit of speaking more than listening can take lives without letting us know. Every life is precious in its own way. So, be a listener in a world full of the speaker and curtail other’s pain.
By Syeda Wajiha Ali
