Mental Auto-Complete

Tweet In order to listen to someone, you need to turn off the "auto-complete" function in your brain and thoughts. When someone is speaking we tend to complete their sentences in our own minds. In the process we fill in the sentence with our own thoughts and opinions.

And most of the time we draw the wrong conclusion and blurt out a response that is wrong, way off the mark and usually has nothing to do with the conversation or the point the other person is trying to make.

So let them finish, process what was said and then respond.

Your confused response may also trigger an auto-complete in the other persons mind as well. And it can be detrimental to you. If you auto-complete and your wrong, their opinion of you is that your are the one that does not understand or does not get it.

Try it. Hopefully by turning off your auto-complete you will not have to use your spell check to make corrections.