This is a hard one for me and perhaps challenging for most lawyers. Or perhaps we became lawyers because of this trait – we love providing solutions. But there are times in life when our friends and family just want us to listen to their problems without telling them how to fix it. Crazy right?

So how do we learn to listen to our loved ones without giving advice as we’ve been trained to do and are expected to do by our clients? A recent article on PsychCentral, How to Listen Without Giving Advice, offers several tips to help us unlearn years of training:

1. Ask If They Want Help: Remember, not everyone wants our sage advice. Ask “Do you just want to be heard or would you like to hear my thoughts?”.

• Practice Active Listening: Focus on the speaker and what they are saying rather than immediately formulating your response. Wait to provide a response until they’ve finished and use your own words to paraphrase what you heard them say.

• Validate Their Feelings: This helps the speaker see that you understand what they’re telling you. Use words and phrases like “I understand why….” or “I would be angry too….”.

• Be a Safe Person to Talk to: Avoid judgment and shame. This could cause them to lose trust in you.

• Practice Compassion: Compassion includes:
  • Recognition of suffering
  • Recognition that suffering happens universally
  • Showing concern to those who suffering and practicing empathy
  • Stabilizing yourself when listening to accounts of someone’s suffering
  • A desire to or acting to help someone alleviate suffering

• Put Yourself in Their Shoes: Empathy means putting yourself in another’s shoes rather than feeling sorry for them. Try to truly understand what the situation must be like for someone. Active listening and reflecting feelings to the person can help you practice empathy.

• Share a similar story: But ask them first if they want to hear about your experience or it could be perceived as redirecting the conversation to yourself. If they are open to hearing about your experience, it could helpful for the speaker to hear how you overcame it.

Like I said, this is a hard one and understanding that sometimes folks don’t want advice is the first step. Remember, to ask first!