YOUR LISTENING ARCHETYPE IS:
The Warrior
You’ve taken a big step to understand how you listen: Let’s celebrate!
The Warrior Archetype listens with an ear to identifing potential attacks and danger, and to protect you well!
When you’re listening through this filter, you may respond by courageously defending yourself – sometimes, by re-directing blame back towards the other person.
Now that you’re here, I’ll show you how to both use your listening archetype to your advantage, and also expand and transform its capacities for your benefit.
First of all…
watch the video below for a
Short Recap of Your Results
Explore The Warrior
Characteristics of the
Warrior Listening Archetype
It’s Time to Learn How to Use Your Strengths as the Warrior to Create Deeper Connection in Your Relationships
People who listen through the archetype or the Warrior, are on the lookout for judgment, criticism or blame, often respond with anger or indignation toward the other, and then either engage in self-defense or counterattack.
The part of you that is active as the Warrior tends to easily see what is wrong with the other person and can quickly identify characteristics in them that you believe need to change. This active Warrior part may have a habit of staying relatively out of touch with your more vulnerable or tender feelings, like sadness, disappointment or hurt, preferring instead to focus on how others and the world should be different and better. You may assume that other people are responsible for making you feel certain things and try to educate them about how to change so that you can get what you need. You may assume that the other person is the problem or the one to blame and work on changing them in order to make things better.
Your listening archetype can be a strength that helps you fight for justice and accountability for wrongdoings if someone has committed an offense against someone else. While you may be quick to see the part that someone else is playing in a conflict, and may easily identify others’ responsibility or culpability in a conflict, focusing heavily on the other person often results in you paying a heavy price in reduced trust and connection in your relationship with that person.
This part of you carries expectations of others that can be unreasonable, and that part of you is likely very critical of other people. You can easily fall into the trap of blaming other people when blame is not theirs — instead of acknowledging your own feelings and needs.
You’re allowed to acknowledge your own feelings and needs if someone criticizes or blames you for something you said or did. It’s important to look beyond the surface when someone offers criticism or blame — to understand what you’re really feeling and needing and express those needs. That’s how we can create deeper connection with ourselves and others.
When you learn more about your archetype and skills to work on, you can improve the harmony in your relationships and get important needs met.
Characteristics of the
Warrior Listening Archetype
It’s Time to Learn How to Use Your Strengths as the Warrior to Create Deeper Connection in Your Relationships
People who listen through the archetype or the Warrior, are on the lookout for judgment, criticism or blame, often respond with anger or indignation toward the other, and then either engage in self-defense or counterattack.
The part of you that is active as the Warrior tends to easily see what is wrong with the other person and can quickly identify characteristics in them that you believe need to change. This active Warrior part may have a habit of staying relatively out of touch with your more vulnerable or tender feelings, like sadness, disappointment or hurt, preferring instead to focus on how others and the world should be different and better. You may assume that other people are responsible for making you feel certain things and try to educate them about how to change so that you can get what you need. You may assume that the other person is the problem or the one to blame and work on changing them in order to make things better.
Your listening archetype can be a strength that helps you fight for justice and accountability for wrongdoings if someone has committed an offense against someone else. While you may be quick to see the part that someone else is playing in a conflict, and may easily identify others’ responsibility or culpability in a conflict, focusing heavily on the other person often results in you paying a heavy price in reduced trust and connection in your relationship with that person.
This part of you carries expectations of others that can be unreasonable, and that part of you is likely very critical of other people. You can easily fall into the trap of blaming other people when blame is not theirs — instead of acknowledging your own feelings and needs.
You’re allowed to acknowledge your own feelings and needs if someone criticizes or blames you for something you said or did. It’s important to look beyond the surface when someone offers criticism or blame — to understand what you’re really feeling and needing and express those needs. That’s how we can create deeper connection with ourselves and others.
When you learn more about your archetype and skills to work on, you can improve the harmony in your relationships and get important needs met.
why understand your
Listening Archetype
What if you had 2x more peace in all of your relationships — at work, at home, and with friends?
What if you could connect with the people who are most difficult to get along with from the wisest, most loving, and most playful part of yourself?
When you know where you are, you know where your next growth step is. You can also get more strategic about where your growth edge is. You can also set yourself on a path to creating deeper connection in your relationships with others, yourself, and your own life purpose.
Most of us find this listening archetype automatic, and it takes effort and intention to start practicing a relational listening style! To avoid getting stuck in a reactive listening style or a defensive cycle, let’s get clear on a game plan that’s accessible, attainable, and actionable.
how to deeply listen to others as
The Warrior
listen
Listen to your own common speech patterns when you receive a hard-to-hear message. Observe with objectivity if you notice that your speech patterns tend to mask accountability for your own feelings.
identify
Identify what types of behaviors or words are the stimulus for your defensive speech patterns. See if you can identify patterns in the behaviors and words of others that may be the stimulus of your feelings.
remember
Remember that what others do or say may be the stimulus of your feelings, but they are not the cause of your feelings.
practice
Practice observing someone else’s behaviors and words without judgment — separate what you observe objectively from your own personal value judgments or analysis about their behaviors and words.
acknowledge
Instead of directing energy in self-defense or counterattack, acknowledge the root of your feelings when you receive criticism or judgment.
trace
Practice tracing your feelings to your own needs and regulate your own nervous system. For example, if you feel disappointment, tie this to your own unfulfilled desires or needs instead of attributing responsibility for your feelings to another person’s actions.
breathe
When you notice yourself blaming someone else, practice breathing into the moment. Observe your thought and speech patterns without judgment. Help your nervous system downregulate. Then find out what emerges next.
translate
When someone else is criticizing or blaming you, see if you can translate that person’s actions and strategies into their underlying feelings and needs.
how to deeply listen to others as
The Warrior
listen
Listen to your own common speech patterns when you receive a hard-to-hear message. Observe with objectivity if you notice that your speech patterns tend to mask accountability for your own feelings.
identify
Identify what types of behaviors or words are the stimulus for your defensive speech patterns. See if you can identify patterns in the behaviors and words of others that may be the stimulus of your feelings.
remember
Remember that what others do or say may be the stimulus of your feelings, but they are not the cause of your feelings.
practice
Practice observing someone else’s behaviors and words without judgment — separate what you observe objectively from your own personal value judgments or analysis about their behaviors and words.
acknowledge
Instead of directing energy in self-defense or counterattack, acknowledge the root of your feelings when you receive criticism or judgment.
trace
Practice tracing your feelings to your own needs and regulate your own nervous system. For example, if you feel disappointment, tie this to your own unfulfilled desires or needs instead of attributing responsibility for your feelings to another person’s actions.
breathe
When you notice yourself blaming someone else, practice breathing into the moment. Observe your thought and speech patterns without judgment. Help your nervous system downregulate. Then find out what emerges next.
translate
When someone else is criticizing or blaming you, see if you can translate that person’s actions and strategies into their underlying feelings and needs.
how to express yourself skillfully as
The Warrior
Notice your statements
Notice when you make statements that mention only the actions of others, attributions of feelings to the behavior of the other person, or impersonal pronouns like “it” and “that.”
Deepen your awareness
Deepen your awareness of your own responsibility for your feelings by substituting attributions to another person’s actions. Instead of tying your feelings to someone else’s actions, use the phrase, “I feel…because I…”
For example, replace a statement like, “You disappointed me by not finishing your food,” with “I feel disappointed when you don’t finish your food because I want you to grow up strong and healthy.”
Let go
Release fear or guilt around having your own needs.
Reconnect with yourself
Practice connecting how you feel with your need. Then practice directly expressing your needs instead of diagnosing someone else’s behavior.
Express your needs
Express your needs while respecting others’ needs and without being unyielding to the needs of others.
I’m going to show you my framework and what you need to do to leverage the best parts of your listening archetype so that you can:
→ Build more peaceful relationships with others —imagine what’s possible when you use a proven framework to handle any charged moment with calm and peace.
→ Deepen your sense of purpose — having a clear connection to your sense of meaning and purpose is integral to your well-being. Imagine reconnecting with your inner wisdom so you can make a meaningful difference in the world.
→ Create a stronger connection with yourself — this is what most communication archetypes overlook. I’ll help you understand why understanding your listening archetype is key to helping you gain more self-acceptance.
specific action steps to take as
The Warrior
Based on your quiz responses, part of you might be accustomed to thinking about analyzing what’s wrong with other people when your needs aren’t being fulfilled. There is an active part of you as the Warrior that tends to blame someone else after receiving a criticism rather than clearly expressing what you need.
Most of us find this type of response automatic because most of us have never been taught to think in terms of our own needs.
As long as the part of you that is active as the Warrior realizes that this comes from an unmet need and you have a better chance of getting needs met when you express those needs directly, you don’t have to blame others. To avoid falling into the trap of defensive listening, here’s what you can do:
01Surround yourself with people who place value on acknowledging one’s feelings and needs. Consider having boundaries with people who also have a tendency to blame others when receiving criticism or judgment.
02When someone directs a criticism to you or says something offensive towards you, check in with how you feel and regulate your nervous system before responding.
03Give yourself space if you’re noticing how frightening it may be to express your needs.
04Resist the urge to ignore your needs.
05 Place greater importance and value on your needs.
06Acknowledge your right to have needs, and give yourself permission to express your needs.
07Practice directly expressing your needs.
I’ve spent a lifetime unlearning self-sabotaging habits and developing the skills and insights needed to communicate in relational ways with myself and others so that I can live an authentic, empowered and connected life.
As a licensed clinical psychologist and life-long educator, I’ve created an online learning and practice community dedicated to helping others understand themselves better, develop more self-compassion and communicate more effectively.
My Recommendations
for you
Based on your listening archetype, here are a few videos from my YouTube channel to help you keep strengthening your listening skills as a Warrior so that you can connect more deeply with others, yourself, and with the meaningful difference you are meant to make in the world:
Ready to take these practices to real life and specific relationships?
Here’s what I want for you…
I want to see you become the most authentic, empowered, and connected version of yourself that is loving to others and yourself.
That’s why in addition to your results, I want to invite you to my free group calls that happen each Wednesday morning, called Conversations from the Heart.
Feel free to bring your questions or just lurk and learn to apply compassionate communication, nonviolent relationship tools, and psychological insights to practice in your life to specific relationships.
Now that you’re part of my community, be on the lookout for an email from me where I’ll send you an invitation. 🙂
With much love and tenderness –
Dr. Yvette Erasmus