When people closest to me are particularly honest with me, they disclose something. You could work on becoming a better listener.

They are right, but still it comes as a blow for the old ego. Like most revelations, it doesn’t come in the most controlled conditions and at first it is hard for me to absorb. After the dust settles though, I see the truth in it. One wise man was particularly gentle and thus more palatable. “Consider that for most of us listening well is so close to loving well that we can’t tell the difference,” he said. From then on I listened earnestly to everyone I spoke with.

Not really, not always, but I did stumble upon a listening hack: assume each person might know something you don’t and listen accordingly. There are always notable exceptions but mostly people have not disappointed.

The world’s great religions hold that humans bear the image of the Divine. People’s very presence is sacred. We become good listeners, then, when we stop treating other humans with overfamiliarity or disdain. “You have never talked to a mere mortal,” C.S. Lewis famously said. “It is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit.” And, one could add, rather guiltily, it is immortals we don’t listen to.

Good listeners acknowledge the other person might be right and they wrong, something I personally still find deeply terrifying. My therapist would say it’s my growth edge. On two separate occasions in just the last week I was 98 percent sure I was right and both times I was proved wrong. Fortunately, both incidents were of trivial significance: disagreeing with my wife about which of our neighbour’s daughters was riding with her when she stopped to chat with us as we picked blackberries, and with a friend on where the entrance to a local swimming cove is located.

They knew something I didn’t. I could have demonstrated more humble listening habits. Loving well means listening well.

There are also other listening hacks I’ve found.

• Pause before answering when tensions are rising.
• Laugh generously when someone uses humour. This one comes with a bonus because I swear laughing benefits the listener more than the speaker.
• Note the other person’s non-verbal cues: their body language, their breath, their facial expression.
• Ask questions like, “Have I got you,” and, “Is there more?”
• Summarise and repeat back key information (don’t overdo).
• Make appropriate affirming and interested noises (definitely don’t overdo).

Basically, try to be less misanthropic.

I am an extrovert who actually enjoys public speaking. It is in my very DNA (no offence, RNA) to opine and pontificate, to voice many inchoate thoughts throughout the course of a day. But to listen? Not so much. Alas, I fully anticipate that more people will remind me of this weakness.

Strangely though, by the grace of God, my ego feels less and less threatened by that. I believe what my wise friend said to be true: I have to listen well if I want to love well. And as a follower of Jesus I know that love always matters more.

Much more, certainly, than the preservation of my ego.