This page features reflections by various members of the St Margaret's family on God in life, the universe and everything...... 

COULD YOU JUST LISTEN?

When I ask you to listen and you start giving me advice, you have not done what I said. 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 problems, you have failed me - strange as that may seem.

Listen! All I ask is that you listen, not talk or do, just hear me. Advice is cheap.

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 do feel what I feel no matter how irrational, than I can stop trying to convince you and get down to the business of understanding it.

Irrational feelings make sense when we understand what's behind them. And when that's clear, the answers are obvious and I don't need advice. Perhaps that's why prayer is so important for some people - God listens and stays with us but doesn't give advice all the time or try to fix things. God listens and gives us the power to work things through for ourselves, but I need you to be with me too.

So, please, just listen. If you want to talk, wait a few minutes for your turn and I'll listen to you.

From the Acorn Christian Foundation's 'Learning to Listen' Course