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crimsonOwl9644
5,618 M Moving Along 1
PathStep 78 Compassion hearts48 Forum posts49 Forum upvotes40 Current upvotes40 Age GroupAdult Last activeFebruary, 2017 Member sinceAugust 23, 2015
Recent forum posts
Listeners not listening
Site Updates / by crimsonOwl9644
Last post
 September 20th, 2018
...See more I love 7 cups. It is an amazing resource. However, I've been encountering a major problem lately. Whenever I connect to a listener to talk about stuff, I walk away from the conversation feeling worse than when I came on the site. This has happened the past 10 or so times. The problem seems to be that the Listeners I have been connecting with (mainly Newbies) are more focused on solving my problem than letting me talk about it. I also have a listener account, so I know about the rules about giving advice, so it's very frustrating for me as a member when I want to talk about things to receive unsolicited advice or even outright commands. For context/example: I was venting about how I only had 4 days to study for a massive biology test (my school has a policy that students receive at least 2 weeks notice for tests) and I had a maths test the day before. I just wanted to vent and de-stress a bit, but the Listeners I spoke to would give me advice about studying or were trying to fix the situation (e.g. maybe the test will be canceled last minute! That happened to me before.*) or outright commanded me to study (e.g. Go study now!*). One even told me off for being on 7 cups instead of studying, when I was trying to look after my mental health by taking a break and de-stressing. I can understand the urge to try and fix the situation, especially when the solution seems blatantly obvious, but I just want to be listened to. And it's even more frustrating when I come on here not feeling great for whatever reason and end up leaving the site more upset than when I came on here. From what I remember of the listening course, there's a decent amount of emphasis on not giving advice, but I was wondering if there might be a way to make the message more obvious? Maybe something like: "Don't feel like you have to solve their problems, just listening can be really helpful"? Again, I really love 7 cups, but I'm just fed up with being given unsolicited advice, commands etc. I just want to be listened to. *Paraphrasing, not quotes from conversations
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