A wise old owl sat on an oak; The more he saw the less he spoke; The less he spoke the more he heard; Why aren’t we like that wise old bird?

I know that you believe you understand what you think I said, but I’m not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.
Robert McCloskey

We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak.
Epictetus

If A equals success, then the formula is A equals X plus Y and Z, with X being work, Y play, and Z keeping your mouth shut.
Albert Einstein

Wisdom is the reward you get for a lifetime of listening when you’d have preferred to talk.
Doug Larson

Lenin could listen so intently that he exhausted the speaker.
Isaiah Berlin

Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.
Winston Churchill

The young people who come to me in the hope of hearing me utter a few memorable maxims are quite disappointed. Aphorisms are not my forte, I say nothing but banalities…. I listen to them and they go away delighted.
Andre Gide

Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again.
Andre Gide

The ear of the leader must ring with the voices of the people.
Woodrow Wilson

The first duty of love is to listen.
Paul Tillich

Listen or thy tongue will keep thee deaf.
Native American Indian Proverb

No one really listens to anyone else, and if you try it for a while you’ll see why.
Mignon McLaughlin

Maybe I wanted to hear it so badly that my ears betrayed my mind in order to secure my heart.
Margaret Cho

As I get older, I’ve learned to listen to people rather than accuse them of things.
Po Bronson

Many a man would rather you heard his story than granted his request.
Phillip Stanhope

I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen.
Ernest Hemingway

Home is where you can say anything you like cause nobody listens to you anyway.

Children have never been good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.
James Baldwin

My wife says I never listen to her. At least I think that’s what she said.

So when you are listening to somebody, completely, attentively, then you are listening not only to the words, but also to the feeling of what is being conveyed, to the whole of it, not part of it.
Jiddu Krishnamurti

A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he gets to know something.
Wilson Mizner

It is the province of knowledge to speak, and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen.
Oliver Wendell Holmes

Listen to the mustn’ts, child. Listen to the don’ts. Listen to the shouldn’ts, the impossibles, the won’ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me… Anything can happen, child. Anything can be.
Shel Silverstein

Everybody lies, but it doesn’t matter because nobody listens.
Nick Diamos

Know how to listen, and you will profit even from those who talk badly.
Plutarch

Don’t worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.
Robert Fulghum

Don’t underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering.
Winnie the Pooh

When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen.
Ernest Hemingway

It is the province of knowledge to speak and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen.
Oliver Wendell Holmes

Set up the listening. Prepare who you are talking to for what you want them to hear. Get people to listen as a possibility rather than a problem.
Mal Pancoast

Lots of people talk to animals…. Not very many listen, though…. That’s the problem.
Benjamin Hoff

The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn’t being said.
Peter F. Drucker

A good listener is usually thinking about something else.
Kin Hubbard

I tell you everything that is really nothing, and nothing of what is everything, do not be fooled by what I am saying. Please listen carefully and try to hear what I am not saying.
Charles C. Finn

Be a good listener. Your ears will never get you in trouble.
Frank Tyger

The only valid censorship of ideas is the right of people not to listen.
Tommy Smothers

Deep listening is miraculous for both listener and speaker. When someone receives us with open-hearted, non-judging, intensely interested listening, our spirits expand.
Sue Patton Thoele

A good listener tries to understand what the other person is saying. In the end he may disagree sharply, but because he disagrees, he wants to know exactly what it is he is disagreeing with.
Kenneth A. Wells

A good listener is a good talker with a sore throat.
Katharine Whitehorn

There are people who, instead of listening to what is being said to them, are already listening to what they are going to say themselves.
Albert Guinon

The first duty of love is to listen.
Paul Tillich

No man ever listened himself out of a job.
Calvin Coolidge

No one is listening until you fart.

I guess I’ve spent my life listening to what wasn’t being said.
Eli Khamarov

Make sure you have finished speaking before your audience has finished listening.
Dorothy Sarnoff

Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. The friends who listen to us are the ones we move toward. When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand.

Women like silent men. They think they’re listening.
Marcel Achard