Please Listen

When I ask you to listen to me and you start giving me advice you have not done what I asked. 

When I ask you to listen to me and you begin to tell me why I shouldn't feel that way, you are trampling on my feelings. 

When I ask you to listen to me and you feel you have to do something to solve my problem, you have failed me, strange as that may seem.

Listen! All I ask is that you listen. Don't talk or do, just hear me. I'm not helpless, maybe discouraged and faltering sometimes but not helpless. When you do something for me that I can and need to do for myself you contribute to my fear. But when you accept as a simple fact that I feel what I feel no matter how irrational, then I can stop trying to convince you and get about this business of understanding what's behind this irrational feeling. When that's clear, the answers are obvious and I don't need advice. Irrational feelings make sense when you understand what's behind them. Perhaps that's why prayer works because God is mute. He doesn't give advice or try to fix things God just lets you work it out yourself. So please listen, and just hear me. If you want to talk, wait a minute for your turn and I will listen. 

-Author Unknown