NeuroTalk Support Groups - Listen...Just Listen

If I ask you to listen, will you?

Listen with your heart, not with logic

Listen with your soul,

Not with indifference

Listen with your feeling,

Not with a story.

If I need hope, don't give me facts.

If I need encouragement,

don't give me advice,

If I need solace,

don't give me platitudes.

If I need to let it out,

don't tune me out.

If I ask you to listen, will you?

Listen with compassion,

not with condemnation

Listen with understanding,

not with argument

Listen with love, not with a clock.

If I ask you to listen, will you?

Make me matter ~ not invisible.

Caress my loneliness

and comfort my pain

Keep my trust and not dishonor it.

I don't need to be right,

but don't make me wrong

I don't need a teacher, a critic,

or a judge

I need freedom to say how I feel

And a friend

who will listen...just listen.

-P.H.Levitt, 1987 SOS Newsletter