Welcome to Day 27 of our 40-Day Retreat.
Yesterday we spoke about silence, the joy of silence, the beauty of silence, the power of silence. Today we follow up with that, but in a different way.
Are you a good listener?
When you become silent you truly listen, or the opportunity is there to truly listen. So today we deal with the art of listening. We may think that we are good listeners, but I think that is worthy of revisiting because in listening, many times, we can miss so much without knowing it.
Have you looked at how you listen, that when you are listening how you are also thinking? If you are in conversation with someone, whilst you are listening you are still processing. You might just be waiting to speak. Sometimes when you think that you have heard the point, you don’t really listen. You start thinking, “What am I going to say?” You then miss a lot of important information that you didn’t have the patience to really listen through. Yet you might think that you are a good listener.
I believe that listening is an important art. We can gain much more knowledge from within when we listen to ourselves deep inside, from others when we listen to them in a deeper way, and from the Universe, if we really listen to the Universe. Listening is an important skill to develop in our interaction with the world.
Listen with your entire being
We think that the ear is very important in listening. I do agree, because you want to capture every word, but what about other parts of you? What about other dimensions to your being? What about your emotional being? Can you perceive what kinds of emotions are flowing in the space? Can you perceive, “What kind of thoughts are arising inside of me?” Can you observe, “What is happening in my whole physical body as I listen? Do I feel something in the gut area? Do I feel something in my knees? Do I feel something in the palm of my hands? You can actually listen with your whole being. Your body is a receiving field for information.
I have been saying to you that it’s a multi-dimensional field, so you listen with your whole being. It allows for a better response because you are picking up more information. When I look around me, however, I find that few people really listen. They miss so much even though they think they are listening.
The skill of listening is a skill I enjoy very much because it allows a greater interaction with my world. And I don’t only listen with my ear but I listen with my entire being as I am doing now with you. There’s a huge amount of listening as I interact with you in this moment. Even though you are physically or vocally quiet, I can pick up the other field of interaction, the subtle energy field. You are actually speaking to me from a different level in the quality of your own listening.
Becoming mentally quieter, listen well; write less
In the art of listening, we need to become mentally quieter because the tendency is to become active mentally. The moment a person starts to speak, we begin to process. Sometimes there are judgments, evaluations at the same time the person is speaking. It shows if you are listening to me and you want to write everything I am saying. I wonder though how much you are really listening as you are writing? Do you miss anything? I remembered a certain teacher once telling a journalist, “Please, don’t write anything. Take my advice. Don’t write anything when I am speaking, but listen, listen well.”
The journalist was surprised to see how much information he or she could have written afterwards just by pure listening. The fear of losing information can actually take away from the listening because you are so caught. So you need to become mentally quiet when you listen, without the fear that you are going to lose information. You need to be able to listen to such a degree that you can follow the steps of the conversation. It’s a skill.
Patient listening
Of course, there’s nothing wrong in taking notes, but the notes shouldn’t disturb you from listening because you want to take everything down. Then there must be patience in the listening. You need to be able to listen through conversations. Even when you think the point has been made and you want to stop listening at that point and begin to think, even though your eyes are focused on the person, you need to hold right there and listen more.
I am sure you know that if you were to record someone speaking and listen to it over and over again, you pick up a lot in the second, third, fourth, fifth listening. Then you get an idea of how much you actually missed the first time.
Listening with the heart
There is also listening with the heart. “Is your emotional being also important in the listening?” Creating a space of comfort, a space of love, a space of welcoming allows you and the other person to be at ease. This is a heart quality. It also brings the patience to listen. The heart quality also gives appreciation of the person and allows you to listen in a better emotional space which enhances the listening. You want to listen, or you enjoy the listening, or you are comfortable in the listening. So am I listening with my heart? Is there a heart quality in my listening? You need to observe that.
Listening with groundedness
Then there is your groundedness. “Am I grounded as I listen? Can I observe within my whole being what my body is picking up as I am listening? Can I pick up the vitality of the person through my body? Can I pick up the fear of the person in the physical experience of my body? What do I pick up in my physical body?”
Listening in the expansive, spiritual space
It is interesting when you listen with your whole being, and then the expansivity of the space in which you listen. This is a spiritual quality. The deeper you go into yourself, or when you begin to observe the centre from which you are listening, the more that you are immersed in your spiritual being, that space of expansivity within you, the more you pick up and the more you connect with the person. You see more. The more you are able to see all the other fields of being. It allows you greater space. So there must be a space, an inner space in your listening, so large that you can pick up everything. You can see everything and you are in a space of the observer. No judgment, no haste. And as you hold this larger space in the listening, you allow for intuition, inner guidance. Sometimes you miss this.
Experiences of listening in this greater field of awareness
When you keep a space in the listening and you are quiet, you are reserving judgment. Ideas begin to flow from inside of you about the situation, as though information is coming from another dimension. This can happen in the collective experience of you and the group, or of you and the other person, because like I said before, the field of the mind is a combined field. The mind is open, not like the closed field of the body, even though the body can still receive. But a mental field is already open. The thoughts of another person can arise within you. The feeling of the other person can arise within you and because both are already held in the Source of being, and the Source of being is connected to a much Greater Field, we can also pick up other solutions that exist, in that field of the Source.
Just think about this. What kind of intuitive response can we give when we are more silent in a space? This is what I love when I am speaking with people. I look for what is coming inside of me and to see what wisdom can unfold from that intuitive space. Of course, in listening, we can listen to the Universe because the Universe speaks. I’ll talk about this more in the future sessions. The Universe speaks to you through every person and through events, and if you really listen to the Universe there’s a lot to learn. We miss so much when we do not listen in the best possible way. Of course I can speak more but during these mornings I have a time limit.
I’ll hold that subject there for now, but I’ve given you food for thought about listening. Listening is just so beautiful. When you can really listen there is so much to learn. There is so much to gain; there is so much to enjoy. And there is so much to use when you listen better.
Post-meditation note:
Though this may seem to be a simple subject, it really isn’t. The quality of your listening determines the quality of experience of your world. The deeper your listening, the richer your world appears. And the quality of your listening also influences your interactions.
May you listen to your Universe today, your inner Universe and your outer Universe and may it bring you great joy.
