Listen

Being a communicative person I enjoy listening and I like when people listen to what I say. My communication is not always the most straight-forward, but if you "listen" you will learn much about me. Most often listening involves reading as well in my life.

I express myself best through writing. Perhaps it is because I have time to ruminate over what I am going to say. Or maybe it is because that is how I have learned to express myself growing up while spilling my guts to a journal and no one else.

For fun I Googled "The Act of Listening" and thought I found a book with that title. I was about to be amazed. But there isn't. However, there is a book entitled "Listening is an Act of Love."

David Isay writes, "[If] we take the time to listen, we'll find wisdom, wonder, and poetry in the lived of people all around us. That we all want to know our lives have mattered and that we won't be forgotten. That listening is an act of love."

He set up a booth, first in Grand Central Station, to record the "untold" stories of people. At the ribbon cutting Studs Terkel said that we know who the architect of the station was, but what about the iron workers, the masons? What are their stories?

Since that day nearly eight years ago, several more booths have been set up around the nation. The book that was published represents the scanning and compilation of nearly 10,000 stories. Isay says that the booths represent 40 minutes set aside to ask important questions and listen closely to answers.

"StoryCorps is a project about permanence in an evermore disposable society. It reminds us of what's really important in the midst of all life's distractions. It encourages us to connect despite endless temptations to detach and disengage."

When I went to YouTube, I thought I might be able to find some of the interviews. I didn't, but I did find this fun little clip about the human voice. Watching it I realized I had seen it before and there are also several others that are fun to watch. It also causes you to think.



The irony behind sharing this video is that I am a writer. But there is something to be said for the human voice. We miss out on so much.