September 24 was on Friday ten years ago and became the longest and saddest day of my life. At seven o’clock that morning a fairly cold and matter-of-fact internist told me my wife had five systems shutting down and they had never been able to save anyone with that many. She went through the list of things they were going to do anyway and left my daughters and me sitting in stunned silence and disbelief. My wife had entered the hospital the night before with what we thought was a case of dehydration.
Read MoreOver fifty years ago I read the two books that changed my life. John W. Drakeford wrote The Awesome Power of The Listening Ear, and Taylor Caldwell wrote The Listener.
Drakeford’s book helped me discover that helping people begins in what they say, not what I know or say. The most powerful and healing part of the human body is the ear. The tongue comes in third after hugging arms.
Caldwell’s book showed me how it works. The book is about a fictional character who sets up a room in a downtown building with a sign that simply says, “The Man Who Listens.” Each chapter is the story of a person she called a soul, entering the room which is curtained across the end. They feel the presence of someone behind the curtain but he or she never says a word.
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