You are making a connection. Your attention makes a difference. If you merely hear someone's words but don't get the meaning, and do nothing to rectify that, then you are hardly paying attention. You have to recognize that the person you are hearing is trying to convey something to you in order to be said to be paying attention at all. For that you must be at least somewhat on her wavelength.
Meaning is conferred by others through paying attention.
Without attention life is not meaningful. You can be a big star, or a successful achiever in any field, but still feel that no one really understands you, that no one pays attention to what you really are or what you really want to express, perhaps because you are afraid to express it. In that case you get very little attention, or so it must feel. In the attention economy, you obtain wealth, that is attention by expressing yourself, putting your real self forward as much as possible. Your property, what is proper to you, is what you can get attention for, and that you must put out in public.