Buon Giorno Coffee, located about a mile from my office, has built a booming business for that very reason.  It sells good coffee, but those who gather there go for connection.  It’s definitely a destination stop; there are no other shopping attractions nearby.  On any week night, you’ll find teens hanging out there to do their school projects.  On weekday mornings, moms meet for muffins, Bible studies, investment seminars, and after-workout lunch dates.  Business professionals take their laptops there to work out spreadsheet data with a colleague.  Couples meet friends there after a ball game.  Lines are long, but nobody seems to mind waiting for a table.  Tables are not the point; hanging around is.

What do they all have in common?  Talking to someone who cares to listen.

Starbucks also generates buzz because it creates community for those who gather there.  A couple of years ago, it “featured” a book called Listening Is an Act of Love, a collection of compelling excerpts from more than 10,000 interviews recorded and compiled by StoryCorps founder Dave Isay.  Each story—a single moment in time, either historical, emotional, or personal—grabs the essence of that person and reflects their human struggles with love, family, loyalty, or whatever.

StoryCorp’s founder had a correct hunch: Many people feel invisible. They believe that what they think, feel, and say doesn’t matter.  They fear they’ll be forgotten once they leave planet earth—that their lives will not have mattered.  So all the producer had to do was to provide a facility, recording equipment, and a facilitator, and then wait for people to invite their family members and friends to sit down and talk.

The results:  Poignant stories for those willing to listen.

French philosopher Voltaire summed it up well:  “The shortest route to a man’s heart is through the ear.”

As you approach the high school or college reunion, graduation ceremony, wedding, family gathering, or other social event, consider your listening-talking differential:  Which body part does most of the work when you’re with friends and family—ears or mouth?   Where’s the love?

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It was January, bitter cold, they were hardly dressed and were starving.  As they stopped to camp overnight my mother broke down and began to cry. A German soldier asked her what she was crying about and my mother said, “I can’t stand it anymore. I’m freezing, starving, and I’d rather you kill me.” He said, “Look at me.” She looked into his blue eyes, blue eyes she could see in her mind the rest of her life. He said, “The war will soon be over and it is us who will be dead and not you. You can make it just a little bit further a day at a time.” He then gave her a piece of his sandwich and ordered her to go guard one of the fires at the camp.

The next day my mother had renewed hope. She looked for an opportunity and noticed two things. When you went through deserted German towns and the road curved, there was a point when the guards couldn’t see you. There were about 1000 girls and only 100 guards. She also noticed when they stopped to camp for the night there were many moments when no guards were visible. At one of those moments she snuck away. Looking for a place to hide she went to a deserted house and scratched the frost off the window to reveal a wonderful scene inside. A Christmas tree with ornaments, but even better with fruit hanging from it. She broke into the house, devoured an apple, but before she could feel the joy of freedom she realized she had left her two sisters and friend back at the campsite. For sure they’ll think she’s dead and this could be “the straw that breaks the camel’s back” for them. She also knew they couldn’t continue the march much longer either. But what should she do? She’d already escaped! It was only a few seconds of deliberation before she thought, “I could not live the rest of my life knowing maybe I could’ve done something. If I can do this once I can do this twice. I’ll sneak back and we’ll get away together.”

So she hid some fruit on her person and tried to sneak back to the camp. But a guard caught her! “Where were you!” he barked. She explained she just wandered off and got lost. He beat her a few times with his rifle. But even during the beating my mother knew that this would be the last time and tomorrow she would escape.

The next day when the road curved and the guards couldn’t see, she, her sisters and friend all scattered. This time my mother found a barrel and waited for hours until nightfall before she came out. The first thing she noticed was silence and that’s when she realized, “I’m free.” Just like that. All things pass. She, her sisters and friend had escaped and survived.

For the rest of her life when times were tough, when problems or upsets would occur, my mother would let her thoughts drift back to those days and put the present circumstances into perspective. Then in her words she would, “Spring into action and do something about it!”

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And contrary to the psychology industry’s biological notion that we choose our mates based on a biological desire to keep our species going, we actually come together on a psychological plane. What actually happens as we mature into adults, and experience relationships that do not lead to marriage, is we develop an unconscious picture of this soul mate. Anyone who has met that one person understands that falling in love is not a biological experience but a mental one, that falling in love happens at a speed unimaginable to those who have not had this most wonderful experience.

But now comes the hard part, trying to figure out how to develop a life together. While the falling in love part happens beyond any imaginable time frame, the falling out of love happens at a turtle’s pace. What is needed to understand is this change in the relationship that takes someone from “for better or worse” to it’s over.

As it turns out, we develop our emotional perspectives from birth, by the examples given to us by our parents. In marriages where the couple struggles between sticking together and splitting up these influences can determine the outcome. What cause those conflicts in so many marriages are these negative insecurities from our past that cause us to fear the same result from our partner today.

What we are doing when we introduce anger and arguments into our marriages is projecting these past insecurities onto our partners, fearing those same results that we have seen before. This is where the wedge in the marriage comes from. What eventually happens after we project those insecurities enough times is we transfer those negative emotions from our past relationships onto our partner causing us to decide to get divorced.

The secret to success is confronting our demons and slaying our dragons, as the sayings go. And this takes courage. For us to be able to look at our partners from a clear, objective perspective we must understand and overcome those influences from our past, we must forgive those who we believe have caused us to be fearful of our current relationship. In psychological terms this is called catharsis. What we must do as individuals is realize that we can look anew at our perspective of our own insecurities. Only then will we be able to develop a marriage where we can stick together throughout whatever life dishes out to us.

To give an example, I forgave my parents when I was 25. I had a conversation with a friend where each was trying to outdo the other on who had the worst childhood, only he still loved his parents. I realized after that conversation that I was wrong in the anger I had built up towards my parents. I admitted for the first time in my adult life that I was wrong. Admitting your mistakes gets a lot easier after that first time.

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Responding from the heart in the face of difficulties is the road less traveled. It is what distinguishes our most inspirational heroes, such as Gandhi, Martin Luther King and Mary Stokes Paul.

I think of the heart as a powerful and loving energy that will not allow our integrity to be compromised and will not compromise the integrity of anyone else. Responding to a potential conflict from the heart leaves us feeling best about ourselves, like our own hero and opens the door for a deepening intimacy in our relationships.

There are many feelings and behaviors that describe the heart, such as love, warmth, and caring. Simply put, they all embody compassion and learning.

In an upsetting situation there are always very important reasons for beliefs, behavior, thoughts or feelings. With an attitude of compassion, we respectfully engage in:

1. Wanting to deeply understand the other person’s position.
2. Learning about our own position and any part we may have in the difficulty.
3. Searching for resolutions that preserve everyone’s integrity.

Although staying heart-connected in the face of upsets is an ideal that no one is always able to maintain, losing our heart does not cause the worst of our difficulties. Failing to learn from those experiences is the Achilles heel that festers into serious relationship problems.

The essential first step in living more heart-connected is to know when you have lost your heart connection. A simple way to know this is to ask yourself, “Am I feeling compassion and am I open to learning about myself and my partner?” Without that awareness you are stuck.

Once you realize that you are disconnected you can:

• Take personal responsibility and acknowledge that you have lost your heart connection. For example, “In trying to prove my point and change you. I lost my heart and I feel badly about that.”
• Do something to regain your center, such as taking some deep breaths or a time out.
• Learn more about the beliefs and fears that created your disconnection. “There are some important issues for me to confront here and I am committed to working on them. I’d also like to know more about your thoughts and feelings.”
• Express sadness about any wounding that occurred when you were disconnected and clean up the difficulties that resulted. Such as, “I feel badly that I disrespected you, and I would like to heal any bad feelings.”
• Begin a compassionate dialogue to resolve the difficulties. “Is there anything else you’re needing before we can try again to get through this issue, and in particular, are you needing anything else from me?

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