Seek To Understand, Then To Be Understood

 “Understanding is loves other name”- Thich Nhat Hanh 

One of the most common themes that arises in the therapy room - and in nearly every kind of relationship we experience from intimate partnerships, parenting, friendships, workplaces, or community - is the longing to feel understood. 

We have all heard the catchy phrase “love is all you need”, but the truth is love is simply not enough. Many psychologists and theorists consider understanding to be essential in creating safe, secure, sustainable, and connected relationships. Where love speaks to a deep affection for another, understanding answers our core human questions: “Do you truly hear and see me? Am I and my experiences significant and valued by you?” Do you understand me? 

When we seek to understand, we are communicating: “your inner world matters to me” 

 What gets in the way of understanding? 

When we enter romantic relationships, become parents, join teams, participate in community, or engage in one of the many other forms of relationships we experience in this life, rarely do we begin with an intention of making the other feel unseen, unsignificant, unvalued. Yet somewhere along the way, many of us stop listening to understand and begin waiting to respond, defend, correct, or protect ourselves. 

Understanding is not agreeing. There is a common misconception and perception that if we understand and value another’s experience or perspective, we are agreeing with it. It does not. To understand another person’s experience is simply to acknowledge it as real and meaningful to them. We can validate someone’s emotions or perspective without abandoning our own truth. Understanding creates connection. Agreement is optional. 

The Ego’s Need To Be Right 

Our ego often shows up as the need to win, to prove a point, or to avoid vulnerability. In moments of conflict, understanding can feel like surrendering power. We fear that if we soften first, we lose. But in reality, the strongest person in a relationship is often the one willing to pause their defenses long enough to truly hear another. The ability to remain grounded in yourself while creating space for another person to feel deeply seen and heard is not weakness - it is emotional maturity. 

Our Inner Child Take The Wheel 

We all enter interactions with our own relational blueprint informed by childhood experiences, early attachments, past wounding, cultural conditioning, and more. What we experience is not reality but our unique filters perception of it. At our core, we share the same human longing to feel seen, valued, significant, and understood. 

When conversations become reactive, defensive, or emotionally charged, it is often a younger, protective part of us taking the lead. The part that fears rejection. The part that learned it had to fight to be heard. 

Suddenly, conversations become tug-of-wars: 

● Fighting to be right 

● Competing to be understood first 

● Plugging our ears instead of opening our hearts 

Seek to understand before trying to be understood. 

That secure, safe, and sustainable relationship you are wanting to cultivate with your spouse, child, colleague, peer, or neighbor is within your hands. It is built through intentionality, curiosity, and emotional presence. And it starts with understanding. 

Actively listen 

Harriet Lerner once wrote: 

“Listen with the same passion with which we want to be heard.” 

True listening is not waiting for your turn to speak. It is suspending your own perspective or agenda to genuinely engage with someone else’s experience. Instead of immediately offering advice, opinions, or rebuttals: 

● Respond with curiosity 

● Reflect back what you heard 

● Ask thoughtful questions 

● Stay open longer than feels comfortable 

Imagine the other person has tossed you a ball. Rather than throwing it back immediately, take a moment to examine it. At first glance it may seem ordinary, but when you look closer, you begin to notice its texture, shape, weight, and meaning. 

People are much the same way. 

Look under the surface 

Often, what is calling to be seen, understood, valued, significant in our eyes is not another’s most mature self or what is being displayed on the surface. When we see reactions, feelings, or stories arise in another - get curious about what is happening underneath the surface. 

Tolerate difference 

Modern relationship conversations often place enormous emphasis on compatibility. If we do not align in music, movies, reading, hobbies, we are not compatible. While shared values and alignment matter, many people have come to believe that difference itself is a threat to connection. But healthy relationships are not built by eliminating difference. They are built by learning how to remain connected within difference. How can we stay grounded in our connectin and offer one another sovereign understanding? How can we strengthen our relationship not by rejecting or controlling difference but managing and even celebrating? How can we become empowered in our individual expression and self-exploration and encourage and inspire one another to do the same? 

Get comfortable with discomfort 

When we feel unseen ourselves, our inner child and own longing to be equally understood can turn us toward our protective mechanisms. Maybe you notice: 

● Defensiveness 

● Shutdown 

● Irritation 

● The urge to interrupt 

● The need to immediately explain yourself 

When you feel your reactions rise up, how do you support them? How can you hold them with compassionate accountability and tolerate the discomfort of not reacting. 

When those protective parts emerge, take your inner child’s hands off the wheel (in the words of Terry Real) and show them how it’s done: 

● Pause 

● Take a breath. Then another. 

● Remind yourself that allowing another person space to be understood does not diminish your own worth, voice, or significance. Another person’s feelings do not erase yours. 

The more we learn to tolerate the discomfort of staying emotionally present, the more secure our relationships become. 

Come back to the same team 

In relationships, when one person “wins,” both people lose. 

Research consistently shows that the majority of relational conflicts are not resolved - they are navigated. The work is not always to eliminate differences, but to learn how to move through them together. Most people are not asking for perfection. They are asking to feel recognized. To hear: 

● I get why you feel that way. 

● I can see your experience. 

● You matter to me. 

● We are in this together. 

And when people feel emotionally safe enough to soften, something beautiful often happens: 

They become more open to understanding you in return. Defenses lower. Walls soften. Connection becomes possible again. 

The gift we most long to receive is often the very gift we must be willing to offer first: 

“I understand you.”