Vom Zuhö­ren

Here was a man who, if he wan­ted, could spend every waking moment in self-pity, fee­ling his body for decay, coun­ting his breaths. So many peo­p­le with far smal­ler pro­blems are so self-absor­bed, their eyes gla­ze over if you speak for more than thir­ty seconds. They alre­a­dy have some­thing else in mind – a fri­end to call, a fax to send, a lover they’­re day­d­re­a­ming about. They only snap back to full atten­ti­on when you finish tal­king, at which point they say „Uh-huh“ or „Yeah, real­ly“ and fake their way back to the moment. (…) We are gre­at at small talk: „What do you do?“ „Whe­re do you live?“ But real­ly lis­tening to someone – wit­hout try­ing to sell them some­thing, pick them up, recruit them, or get some kind of sta­tus in return – how often do we get this any­mo­re? I belie­ve many visi­tors in the last few months of Morrie’s life were drawn not becau­se of the atten­ti­on they wan­ted to pay to him but becau­se of the atten­ti­on he paid to them. Despi­te his per­so­nal pain and decay, this litt­le old man lis­ten­ed the way they always wan­ted someone to listen.
(Mitch Albom – Tues­days with Morrie)