Listening Beyond Filters
By Leslie Sann
Listening is the willingness to be changed by what you hear.
—Alan Alda
Every second, your brain takes in about 11 million bits of information through your senses.
But your conscious mind processes only around 10 to 50 of them.
Which ones?
The ones shaped by your conditioning—your personal history, your beliefs, your wounds, your worldview.
So even when someone speaks clearly,
what you hear might not be what they said.
You’re not hearing the words.
You’re hearing your filtered version of the words.
This is how misunderstandings happen.
This is how relationships fracture—not because people don’t care, but because we’re living in different interpretations.
There’s a story about the Native people on the island where Columbus landed.
The ships were right there, visible on the horizon.
But they didn’t see them.
Their eyes took in the data—but their minds had no concept for what they saw.
So the ships became invisible.
Not because they weren’t real.
But because their minds filtered them out.
What are you filtering out?
What are you not seeing, not hearing, not receiving—
simply because it doesn’t match your known reality?
This is why listening is more than hearing.
It’s an act of presence.
It’s the willingness to pause and ask:
Is the message I received the one that was sent?
Am I responding to what’s true… or what I made it mean?
When you learn to listen beyond your filter,
you become a safer place—for yourself and others.
You stop defaulting to the familiar 10 or 20 bits
and open the field to what else might be true.
That shift can change everything.
Listening can be learned.
And when it is, life gets even better.
Blessings and Joy,