Seek first to understand, then to be understood

I first came across this quote from the book 7 habits of highly effective people by Stephen Covey1 and I actually found it very intriguing. The problem I found out judging from myself, and from other people, is that especially in times of critical conversations I wasn’t actively listening. Instead I would focus on the words and miss the meaning. A lot of people are also not even listening. Instead they would only think their reply or the next question to ask....