The degree to which I can create relationships, which facilitate the growth of others as separate persons, is a measure of the growth I have achieved in myself.
Carl RogersRead
It is astonishing how elements that seem insoluble become soluble when someone listens, how confusions that seem irremediable turn into relatively clear flowing streams when one is heard.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Listening can transform seemingly impossible problems into manageable solutions.
This quote by Carl Rogers highlights the profound impact of active listening in interpersonal communication. It suggests that by truly hearing and understanding others, we can help them clarify their thoughts and feelings, turning complex issues into clearer perspectives. Listening fosters connection and understanding, leading to the resolution of conflicts that may initially seem insurmountable.
Themes
ListeningCommunicationUnderstandingClarityRelationships
In practice
Example use cases
During a team meeting to resolve conflicts, someone might say this quote to emphasize the importance of listening to each other's views.
More from Carl Rogers
All quotes →The kind of caring that the client-centered therapist desires to achieve is a gullible caring, in which clients are accepted as they say they are, not with a lurking suspicion in the therapist's mind that they may, in fact, be otherwise. This attitude is not stupidity on the therapist's part; it is the kind of attitude that is most likely to lead to trust.
Carl RogersRead
I prize the privilege of being alone.
Carl RogersRead
Though modern Marriage is a tremendous laboratory, its members are often without preparation for the partnership function. How much agony and remorse and failure could have been avoided if there had been at least some rudimentary learning before they entered the partnership.
Carl RogersRead
I have come to think that one of the most satisfying experiences I know — and also one of the most growth-promoting experiences for the other person — is just fully to appreciate this individual in the same way that I appreciate a sunset.
Carl RogersRead
In my early professional years I was asking the question: How can I treat, or cure, or change this person? Now I would phrase the question in this way: How can I provide a relationship which this person may use for his own personal growth?
Carl RogersRead
Similar quotes
If friends disappoint you over and over, that's in large part your own fault. Once someone has shown a tendency to be self-centered, you need to recognize that and take care of yourself; people aren't going to change simply because you want them to.
Oprah WinfreyRead
Yesterday I went home with him and we did the usual things. I haven't the nerve to put them down, but I'd like to, because now when I'm writing it's already tomorrow and I'm afraid of getting to the end of yesterday. As long as I go on writing, yesterday is today and we are still together
Graham GreeneRead
I put on an act sometimes, and people think I’m insensitive. Really, it’s like a kind of armor because I’m too sensitive. If there are two hundred people in a room and one of them doesn’t like me, I’ve got to get out.
Marlon BrandoRead
When you really listen to another person from their point of view, and reflect back to them that understanding, it's like giving them emotional oxygen.
Stephen CoveyRead
Male and female have the power to fuse into one solid, both because both are nourished in both and because soul is the same thing in all living creatures, although the body of each is different.
HippocratesRead
Our world is increasingly interdependent, but I wonder if we truly understand that our interdependent human community has to be compassionate; compassionate in our choice of goals, compassionate in our means of cooperation and our pursuit of these goals.
Dalai LamaRead