Improv

How hard it is to listen.

I want to be heard, but I don't want to listen. Not really. I don't need to, do I? I know what people are going to say anyway. It's easier to listen to the voices in my head, the ones that know the script.

Or the voices in my head that tell me what someone really means by what they say. It’s like a play we’ve done before, and we’re just rehearsing the lines again. I know their motivation, I know the exit line, and I’m just going through the motions to get there. Exit stage left.

Or if it’s a stranger, I have them typecast at a glance. I know the role they play in life, and what lines to expect from them. God forbid they should step out of the part I put them in.

What if I looked at it as Improv? What if every interaction were Improvisational Theater, where I don’t know what role my partner in this dialogue is going to assume? I have to listen first to what he or she says, understand it, and then form a response. Together we could write an original scene, be the characters we choose, and accept each other as those characters.

That’s how I want to be heard. Shouldn’t I listen the same way?

Suddenly listening seems easier.
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