Learn to Love to Listen

Welcome everyone, as always, I’m Sol and today I’m going to be sharing some tips from my experiences as a long-time role-player and wellness educator. This advice will help you play better games, have more fun around the table, and improve your health and wellness. The article for today is going to focus on using a trick from motivational interviewing to improve your communication skills as a player, game master, or friend!

“When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen.” –Ernest Hemingway
Learn more about how to listen on @SolsRoles blog!
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There is a big difference between hearing someone and listening to them. This advice is all over the place so I’m going to skip ahead to the good bits that apply here. Let’s talk about why you should listen as a starting point. Listening to the other people at the table is the single most important and impactful way to improve your gaming experience. The following advice applies to anyone playing the game but lets start with running a game first.

If you are the person running the game, then listening is going to give your players an opportunity to express their character, they will feel heard and valued, and they can for a moment be the star of the show that they want to be. By listening you also give yourself information about what that player really values and looks forward to in the game. Further, by asking questions rather than making statements, you take some of the load off your own shoulders. If a player asks, “What do I know about X?” consider asking them to tell you the rumors they have heard before you give them any info. Sometimes those ideas a player throws out there will beat anything you had planned, and even if not, it tells you a bit about how that player and character imagine their version of your world!

If you are a player, you might think that you are very familiar with listening. You spend all session listening to some hoary game master drone on and on, right? Well, when is the last time you really sat and listened to the story other players are telling? By investing time and energy in caring about the other player character’s stories you can get more out of the game you are playing. Every player at the table has an incredible wealth of information and creativity that you can be entertained by, excited by, and even build your own stories with! I encourage you to ask more questions, investigate the other characters, engage with them, and let them tell you a story. I promise, the more you do this and the more it catches on at the table, then you will have ever more fun!

Outside of the game table there are a lot of benefits to this as well. By training yourself to be still and listen to the stories other people tell you will have a richer experience with other people in your life. If you get used to asking another player how their character feels in a certain moment, that skill will translate to real life as well. You will become more sensitive, more caring, and more attractive. People will trust you more, and they will listen to your stories more as well.

How do you build this skill? As with most things, it is simple but not necessarily easy. The first step is to cultivate an appreciation for other people and what they say. Practice thanking people for speaking and sharing their stories, be genuine about it, and be sincere. This will encourage people to continue to share with you, and even if you struggle with putting your effort and energy into being present in the moment, it indicates that you really do care. The second step would be to work on being present with the storyteller. This can be a challenge for many people, I realize this, so make these steps in your own time and way. However, by paying attention, stilling your own thoughts, and managing your desire to add to the story you can build rapport and focus that will result in richer experiences for everyone. Lastly, I encourage you to ask more questions, especially about emotions. When you show interest by asking questions you encourage the speaker to share more details, and often those are the more interesting details as well!

I hope that this article has helped you improve your gaming! If you enjoyed it, please sign up to be a member on my Ko-Fi, your support there makes me able to continue to write these articles and provide excellent gaming content as well!