The listener who doesn’t listen

There is one possibility when the speaker might feel it’s relevant and the listener can find it irrelevant. That is when the listener is not able to connect the dots which the speaker is connecting. Having said both, often the listener can use the word irrelevant for their convenience while the speaker is just being elaborate and articulate. You may ask for a short answer by stating it, as your need for the short answer. But, not blame the speaker for being irrelevant and incapable of keeping it short.

Otherwise, people tend to label their fatigue of listening or incapability of listening as the speaker’s inability to keep it short.

The speaker is mostly speaking from a space of opening up, by misinterpreting cold curiosity as interest or worse 'concern’. The listener who craves for short answers is mostly motivated by cold curiosity, as it’s clearly lack of investment. For one of the situations, the listener who is really invested might be tired and not able to offer his attention. If that person is truly concerned, s/he will state it to the speaker before the listener, for whom they care, gets affected by their lack of attention. Deep listening, that’s a subject and skill, calling for separate work. Here we are focusing on just listening, between two people.

To be continued…