If you attend your niece’s band concert, and she plays the bass clarinet, and you’ve never heard a bass clarinet, you won’t know what to listen for. You’ll hear music. You’ll hear many different sounds. But you won’t know which one belongs to your niece.

When we don’t know what something sounds like, we can’t listen for it. We can think about this as it relates to musical instruments, but it’s a useful metaphor too.

What are you listening for? Do you know what it sounds like?