Over the past 6 months I have been doing some research for a book that I am writing. It's all about bringing a different kind of listening to family life. As a result, I have been witness to some amazing stories unfold as individual parents explore what is on their mind in a Listening Space - a process that involves a combination of repeating key words the other person has used and asking them Clean questions. What follows is the transcript from one such session in which a fa

Managing the sense of 'busy-ness' that life can bring: using Clean questions to bring a moment of calm reflection and connect with w

I’ve recently started running Listening Space courses for parents in which participants are: introduced to models of human behaviour to help them understand their own thoughts and emotions better – such as Steve Peters’ Chimp Paradox experience powerful new ways of listening deeply to themselves and to others using Clean Language questions, and are given tools to help nurture healthy relationships within the family. I interviewed one participant, whose children are 8 and 6 ye

Over the past few years I have noticed that if I sit still for long enough to ‘capture the moment’, a poem appears.  And if I find myself gr

Taking time to reflect on what's important to you can be a great antidote to all the busy-ness of our everyday lives. This blog invites

Teenage life comes with its ups and downs, bringing with it emotions that can feel confusing and overwhelming at times. As a parent of a teenager it is easy to find yourself distanced and shut out when all you want to do is help to make things better. In this blog Mishtu tells us about the impact that using Clean questions has had in her relationship with her 13 year-old daughter, Anika, enabling them to communicate more openly with one another. Even from when she was tiny, A

I recently interviewed Annie Rappeport, a 32 year-old American PhD student, about her experience of chronic illness as part of a listening project for the International Listening Association. Clean questions were used to invite Annie to consider what has worked well for her in navigating the past six years of ill-health. It is hoped that her very eloquent and moving answers might provide a useful resource for others who find themselves in a similar situation and for the healt

Clean questions help to keep a conversation going without me having to think of clever things to say.

When someone is feeling tension all around the top of their body, how could just two simple questions be as helpful as a massage? Clean questions are a simple, powerful and respectful way of inviting a person to explore their experience. These questions, used with the exact words or gestures the person has used, help to keep the assumptions, suggestions and interpretations of the person asking the questions out of the way - leaving the person answering the questions free to d

The Listening Space can be used for joint exploration, facilitating two people together to explore an issue that is important to them. Wheth

Meet Jo – a police sergeant who manages a community policing team. Over the past couple of years the demands of Jo’s work have changed significantly. She finds that she has an ‘increasing number of jobs half finished’, which leaves her feeling very stressed. Whilst many of the changes that have taken place are beyond her control, she believes that her stress levels aren’t helped by the fact that she is ‘not a good closer’. At a recent management training event she learnt how

Change the way we listen to ourselves and we make better decisions, imagine our future more clearly, and take more pleasure in what we do. Change the way we listen to others and we can understand and connect with them with greater richness and depth, to mutual benefit. Clean Language is a simple, powerful and respectful way of communicating and exploring a situation. At its heart lies a set of Clean questions combined with a person’s exact words only. If we remain curious and

Naoki Higashida's powerful description of living with autism is a salutary reminder that we should never assume to know what another per

Asking Clean questions is a great way of helping someone explore and develop creative ideas. The Listening Space helps to give structure to

Asking Clean questions of the metaphors we naturally use to describe our experience helps us to bring them into focus, making them more defi