Illustration by Robert Carter
The solution to all the world's human problems, from loneliness to climatic catastrophe, lies with people, and it starts with listening. And no one did more to teach me that lesson than Tasha Larson almost 30 years ago.
In the summer of 1989, as I was entering my third year, I attended a campus club confab and found myself at the table for CJSR-FM's campus radio. The woman running it was Tasha, the station's tough news and public affairs director. I asked her if I could get my own radio show on politics - because why not just ask? She told me to report to the station for training.
A partner and I started a show called Radio H.E.R.E.T.I.C.S., and let me tell you, we sucked. Our radio work was as exciting as our essays. We lacked brevity, personality, humour, effective storytelling - pretty much everything radio needs. After two months of suffering our weekly output, Tasha heard me preparing to interview an anti-apartheid organizer from South Africa. As usual, I was as loose as a man in a full-body cast: reading questions from a sheet, not making eye contact, and behaving as if I were programming an old mainframe with punch cards rather than conversing with an actual human being.
Tasha, who, despite her appearance and youth could at times remind one of Bea Arthur's Dorothy Zbornak on The Golden Girls, told me something like, "That's a person. Forget the questions on your paper. Just look him in the eye and smile and have an actual conversation."
That advice changed me forever.
I began wording questions to make them more personable, and spent my interviews not just waiting for the next break to shove in my next question, but by listening to hear what mattered so I could ask them about it.
I've learned that deep listening (not just asking questions other than, "So how do you feel about that?") is cheaper, more convenient and more effective than marriage counselling.
So, thank you, Tasha. I always ask my guests to tell me about their favourite teachers, however they define the word, and you're definitely on my own list.
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