When i ask you to listen to me
and you start giving me advice
you have not done what i asked.
When i ask you to listen to me
and you begin to tell me why
i shouldn’t feel that way,
you are trampling on my feelings.
When i ask you to listen to me
and you feel you have to do something
to solve my problem,
you have failed me,
strange as it may seem.
Listen! all i ask is that you listen.
Don’t talk or do-just hear me.
Advice is cheap; 20 cents will get
you both Dear Abby and Billy Graham
in the same newpaper.
And i can do for myself; I am not helpless.
Maybe dicouraged and flatering,
but not helpless.
When you do something for me that i can
and need to do for myself,
you contribute to my fear and
inadequacy.
But when you accept as a simple fact
that i feel what i feel,
no matter how irrational,
that i can stop trying to convince
you and get about this business
of understanding what’s behind
this irrational feeling.
And when that’s clear, the answers are
obvious and i don’t need advice
Irrational feelings make sense when
we understand what’s behind them.
So please listen and just hear me.
And if you want to talk, wait a minute
for your turn-and i will listen to you.
~Leo Buscalgia