Maybe 30% off is too much

 DID YOU HEAR ABOUT. THIS ??? 30% OFF EVERY DAY!!

Well.. I’ve heard some great audio books lately.  Jeff Tweedy’s book on songwriting (and more). Seinfeld’s book, and Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey  are a couple of nonfiction gems.  Ready Player One was a good listen and if I were  writing book reviews  I would mention about 25 more good things  I’ve listened to in the last  couple months.  However, this entry isn’t about books so much as it is about listening.  Along with  this blog there is a podcast about seeking peace and joy  which has had an increased  listenership over the past few months.  I sometimes rpeat material and sometimes not, and was wondering if repeating things was a bad idea so I looked some information about listening itself as an activity and  found out some interesating things that may impact a search for  peace and joy.  

I’ll leave a link below for further reference.

Ok listen up.... read this out loud for maximum effect as people learn about 85% of what they know by listening.  So listening sounds good right?  Well maybe...maybe not.  It seems that right after hearing things most people can only remember about half of what they hear and within  a few hours that rate is discounted by 30%.  Yes...a few hours after hearing something most people only retain about 20%.  Most people talk at about 130-150 words a minute, however  your brain has the capacity to hear about 450 words a minute at the maximum.  What does this meaN?  When you are locked in and listening  your brain has a lot of time on its hands to get distracted by  all kinds of things including noise other than what is being said.  

Women apparently process what they hear with both sides of their brain  while men tend only to be listening on the right side so there’s some chance we may say what we mean and mean what  we say but we’re not creating the  same meanings and storing the info in the same ways.  

Most adults  spend  a solid four hours a day listening to  things intentionally such as radio, stereo, computer streaming media, etc and youth are not far behind.  

Listening to music  (especially calmer music) does seem to improve performance  in a wide variety  of tasks including  doing math and driving.  I’m not sure where these studies were done and I’m pretty sure Sister Gregory didn’t have Black Sabath or Led Zep blasting at the convent while she was preparing  lesson plans for Algebra II.  

Anyway.. what’s listening have to do with peace and joy?  

Well for one it seems as if meditation is listening. To one’s soul.  For another  it seems like we make more. Meaningful connections by listening and asking questions than we do by making sure  we are being heard all the time.  In fact, it seems that  a person who refuses to listen will often  wind up in a place full of people. Who have nothing interesting to say.  

So I guess my question... the question I am asking myself... is... can I pick out the 20% of what I heart that is important?  Will I have the patience. To have things repeated until  I feel certain enough to change my notions about the world knowing I’m using a lot of time I effectively?  I fancy myself a pretty good listener as do many of you, however, how often do we practice listening skills with anyone awareness we are doing so and how would that change our connections with others?  I don’t know the answers to these questions but I’d love to hear your thoughts and If unpunished ask “Can you hear me now?” I’ll say yes and that I’m listening!https://www.creditdonkey.com/listening-statistics.html