Listen to Hear

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This post is part of a series of 31 Day to Cultivating Heart Connections with Your Child as part of the 31 Days of Five Minute Free Writes Challenge.

We listen, but we don’t hear.

We nod, but we don’t comprehend.

We say, “Yeah,” while our minds are elsewhere.

Or, we say “No,” before hearing the full sentence.

We reprimand before listening to the details.

Like last Christmas.

I overheard my husband tell my daughter, “You need to ask Mommy before you write on the ornaments.”

“Say what?!?!?”

 I almost didn’t wait for an explanation. The nursing baby was unlatched, and I jerked out of the chair where we had been peacefully rocking. My eyes frantically searched to see what damage had been done to the ornaments. They landed on the baby’s first ornament, a rustic wooden pickup I had carefully written on. My script had been scribbled out with permanent marker and written over with her own jagged letters.

As my anger welled up, I felt ready to explode and took a breath to do just that.

In that pause, my daughter quickly explained she had noticed the wheel falling off the baby’s ornament and wanted him to have her matching ornament so that his ornament wouldn’t be broken.

Thankfully, I listened. Because the details of what she shared showed me her heart for her baby brother. Had I exploded like I had intended to do, I would have crushed her heart instead of understanding it.

How many times have I failed? More than I can count. Too many times I have jumped to conclusions.

But that day as I got it right for once, I learned a valuable lesson—we must listen to hear not just to respond. If we want to cultivate a heart connection with our child, we must truly hear what they are saying. This is true not only in moments of crisis and discipline but also when our children are sharing the little things in their lives.

Our children need us to look them in the eye when they speak for eye contact tells them we are listening.

Our children need us to engage with what they are telling us for engaging tells them we care.

Our children need us to listen to hear what they are saying not just to respond so that we can connect with their hearts.

Listening to hear cultivates heart connections.

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