Asking Eric: Learning to listen instead of interrupting

Dear Eric: This is in response to the letter from “Less Talk” who talked too much to friends and wanted to stop.

I, too, used to interrupt people and was unable to stop. Then, through a friend I learned the art of listening and discovered some reasons why I kept interrupting people. Some examples of why I didn’t let people finish their sentences were because “I already know where you’re going with this, and I have something more clever to say;” because “I might forget what I have to say and lose this great opportunity to impress you;” because “you aren’t interesting enough to distract me from my scary thoughts;” because “you’re having such a hard time expressing yourself, I’m going to rescue you by saying it better;” because “interrupting you is a natural expression of my enthusiasm” to name a few.