This reading is called Listening by Maggie Stevens.
Many years ago,
When my oldest grandchild was my only grandchild,
He was busy with blocks on the living room floor.
Unexpectedly,
He raised his head from his play and said with wonder,
Listen.
Quiet.
At the time,
Those two words seemed incongruous.
We don't listen to quiet.
We listen to music,
Videos,
And conversations.
Theoretically,
We listen to communicate.
But mostly,
We listen to hear ourselves talk.
We look for a break and another speech to get our own words in.
No doubt,
Each of us has answered a question,
Often incorrectly,
Before the speaker completed asking it.
Often,
We are planning our responses instead of listening,
Just waiting for the other person to take a breath so we can talk.
This is how our brain functions.
They register topics and then scan their memories for all the pertinent files.
They're like our own personal Google search engines.
We generally think we're listening with our ears,
Which were designed for that purpose,
But the brain is running and running in the background.
What if we took the radical opportunity to listen with our hearts instead?
To listen with our hearts means holding other people and their words in spacious kindness.
We acknowledge that they have hopes and fears,
Just as we do.
Our primary purpose is to connect.
As Rumi says,
Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and right-doing,
There's a field.
I'll meet you there.
Listening with our hearts is investing the time to learn more,
To reflect back what the other person is saying without judgment.
Sometimes it means asking for clarification.
Tell me more about that.
Or,
How did that feel?
Sometimes our response is to hold others in our loving hearts.
Ouch!
That sounds painful.
I'm sorry that happened to you.
Each of us have experienced what the Buddhists call the eight worldly winds.
Pleasure and pain,
Gain and loss,
Praise and blame,
Fame and disrepute.
We have all been vulnerable when seeking wholeness and acceptance.
So the next time you sit down for a conversation,
Try both of my grandson's observations.
Quiet.
Listen.
I hope you enjoyed this writing.
You can find other talks and meditations under Maggie Stevens on Insight Timer.
I wish you well.
