Leadership Series: Seek First to understand , then to be understood- Part 2

As we saw in the prev post, how by empathically listening and reflecting Priya's feelings so that she knows you are genuinely trying to understand her- Priya felt understood, she felt that you valued her feelings and understood them. That helped her calm down. The friendship remained intact and both friends were able to understand each other.

For us to understand the other person's feelings truly and develop compassion for them- even when they are attacking us, we need the following:

1. Value the relationship over your own ego: 
1. Everyone is a part and parcel of Krishna, just like us. We want to connect with people at that level.
2. "ACT out of values not out of weak emotional feelings" 

1. Acknowledge to ourselves about how we are feeling when we are being attacked as we saw in this example.Maintain your calm - its natural to feel how you are feeling but you do not act on your feelings. You act on the value that you first want to understand.
2. God has "Given us two ears and one mouth for a reason" - "Listen Twice as much as you talk"
3. Put yourself in the other persons shoes and mirror how they are feeling- 

1. Examples- seems like you are feeling very betrayed after hearing this, seems like you feel sad for your friend, seems like you feel bad that your friend is doing this to you,etc. 
2. Focus on "FEELING" words.

When we try to understand the other person- we make them feel loved and valued. This makes them want to understand, love and value us in turn.

Leadership Series: Seek first to understand, then to be understood.- Part 1

This is a very important leadership trait. It is habit number 5 in Steven covey's "7 habits for highly effective people".
It is a great leadership skill and it is required in almost every thing we do and every career-  be it a lawyer, a doctor, a teacher and also in every role we play in our lives- daughter, mother, sister, friend, etc.
We can be successful only when we seek first to understand.

A doctor can be successful when he truly understands what their patient is saying to them to correctly diagnose the disease. A good teacher is one who understands the student very well and explains things in a way in which they can comprehend.

"Feeling understood" is a universal need
Every person desires that the world truly understands them and their feelings. It makes them feel accepted and loved. Therefore we must first try to hear empathic-ally- understand the feelings of the other person before we chose to respond .

Seek first to understand

Since wanting to be understood is a universal need - if in a conflict if we
can try to first understand the other person before expecting them to understand us - it has a very positive result even if both parties disagree with each other. The relationship remains pleasant and cordial.

Suppose your friend Priya has heard from someone that you spoke badly about her to Mansi and she is feeling hurt and talking with you about it.

Priya: I am so upset with you. You are not my friend anymore.How could you do this to me?You broke my trust. I never though you could speak like this about me. I never thought you of all my friends could do this to me.

You:(You are feeling hurt that you are being accused of something that you have not done. You are feeling hurt that Priya could believe the lies that others are saying about you even without once checking with you)
Priya I am shocked that you think like this about me. I could never do that. How could you accuse me like that.I have been your friend for so long and we have done so many things together- how could you not trust me after knowing me for so long.

Priya: (even more hurt- thinking that you are lying) Its one thing that you spoke behind my back and now you are denying it.

You: Why don't you believe I did not do that.
Priya : ...... More of the same.........

and this goes one and on.

The conversation would have been very different if one of  the girls decided to really understand the other person.GIVING UNDERSTANDING TO THE OTHER PERSON HEALS THEM AND CALMS THE STORM THEY ARE FEELING INSIDE.

Priya: I am so upset with you. You are not my friend anymore.How could you do this to me?You broke my trust. I never thought you could speak like this about me. I never thought you of all my friends could do this to me.

You:(You are feeling hurt that you are being accused of something that you have not done. You are feeling hurt that Priya could believe the lies that others are saying about you even without once checking with you.You give compassion to yourself - says its natural for you to feel like that, but you decide to not act on your feelings but you take the mature step to really understand Priya and her feelings first and then when she is calmer you will ge a chance to express genuinely about how you felt when you heard that)
Seems like you are feeling very hurt about something I have done and you are feeling I broke your trust

Priya: (even more hurt- thinking that you are lying) Its one thing that you spoke behind my back and now you are acting as if you do not know anything.

You: (You keep your emotional balance and say the same thing again with the same calmness as before)
Seems like you are feeling very hurt about something I have done and you are feeling I broke your trust. I am really sorry but I do not know what you are referring to - I am most willing to correct my behavior if you feel I have made a mistake and it has hurt you. It will be very helpful for me if you can tell me what have you heard.

Priya : (seeing your sincerity in understanding her she becomes a little calm- she can see that you are genuinely feeling sad about how she is feeling and you are sincere about correcting yourself. This causes her to think that maybe you really do not know what is going on) Mansi told me that you told her that you do not like me and that it is a pain for you to be my friend and that you hate coming to my house and that next time you go to Wild waves you will not take me with your family but you want to hang around other friends.

You: hmmm. (really trying to put yourself in Priya's shoes and feel what she would have felt when she heard this from Mansi.)
This must have been very painful to hear for you. If I were in your place I would have felt the same way as you are feeling, probably worse. I thank you that you are at least open about how you are feeling- I would have never talked to me friend about it and just given her the cold shoulder.

Priya: And you also said that you would love to be in a different dance class than me because you think I am a slow learner and so many other things. Did you say all this to her? (Just because you are showing her understanding and valuing her feelings - Priya has shifted from being confident that you back bited her TO now asking you if you did it and giving you a chance)

You: I feel really sorry about how you feel. Mansi and I did meet each other and we talked about a lot of things. I feel bad that she misquoted me on some of the things I said. I was telling her that my school group wants to go to wild waves together and I might go with them. She asked me if I would take you along with me to which I said that "Priya might feel lost with my school friends because she doesn't know anybody, I think I will go somewhere else with all my temple friends."
Also I did talk about dance class and did tell her I would be changing my class- because I want to learn Bharat Natyam Fusion for a while and that happens in a different class. I also find the current dance class to slow for me and I think fusion will be faster and more fun.

Priya: I feel so bad that Mansi did this and that I believed her.And I feel really bad that I spoke to you the way I did. I am sorry.

You: Its ok these kind of things happen. Its important that you spoke about it. We could clear things.

Priya: Thank you for being so patient.I am so happy to have you as my friend.

Leadership Series: Becoming a Truthful devotee

Some questions that help in the discussion :

1. What does being truthful mean to you?
2. Why should a devotee be truthful?
3. Why dont we or others behave truthfully at times?
4. What are the areas we should be truthful to ourselves about in our growth in KC
1. Honest Acceptance of who we really are- which means accepting what is good in us and also accepting our areas of growth.
2. Honest Acceptance of our motivations when we engage in different activities
3. Once we have made an honest assessment of who we are and have accepted ourselves- then we can gradually improve ourseleves one step at a time. 
4. If we do not do an honest appraisal of ourselves we will never know our shortcomings. Thus we will repeatedly commit the same mistakes