How to Listen (to Others and Yourself) - Part 1

Essay #2

“And, where are you, with your ears bagged down as if with packets of sand? Listen. We all have much more listening to do. Tear the sand away. And listen. The river is singing.” — Mary Oliver   

As I was working on the seeing clearly project, I realized that using our eyes to see was only one part of it. The whole body has to be involved; all of the senses wide awake, and I believe that listening may be the most important element. 

I started to think more about this after hearing Krista Tippet’s On Being interview with acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton. He has traveled the world collecting recordings of sounds in some of the most remote places on earth. As a young adult, he had an epiphany about sound while taking a break during a long drive across the country. He stopped to take a rest in a field by the side of the road during a thunderstorm. As he lay there, hearing the thunder and crickets chirping, he realized that he had never really listened before. From that day forward, Hempton’s goal was to become a better listener.

Pause for a minute and note everything you hear right now, right where you are.

I hear the hum of my space heater, the wind blowing, the quiet between the gusts, the window frame making a cracking sound from the wind, my daughter’s cough, and my breath going in and out. All of these sounds are clues, telling a story of  where I am, who I’m with, the environment around me, and even the time of year.

What does it mean to listen?

Years ago, while volunteering at a Peace Learning Center, we taught school kids about ways to resolve conflict and listening was a part of it. The facilitators introduced the Chinese symbol for listening (below), which includes much more than using our ears.

This symbol shows that active listening requires ears to hear, eyes to see without judgment, giving undivided attention with the mind, and feeling empathy with the heart. Using silence well is also important. I’m going to use this symbol to frame our discussion of what it means to listen.

Listening with our Ears

In his book, The Spell of the Sensuous, David Abram calls vision and hearing the two “distance senses,” meaning they enable us to make contact with things at a distance. Vision explores the outer surface of things and hearing makes contact with the inside. We experience sound through waves, or vibrating molecules, which are felt in the body. This is why it’s the inner sense. 

Sound is invisible, yet it’s a huge part of our everyday lives, although often it’s in the background of our consciousness. Of course, some sounds are loud, jarring, or disruptive and we call this “noise.” I’m sure you’ve had occasion to put your hands over your ears when faced with a loud or unwanted sound. 

Every day, most of us experience what is called “noise pollution,” something that is increasingly a problem, especially in cities. It negatively affects our health and causes us to close down our hearing. Being bombarded by noise can affect our mood and relationship to a place. Gordon Hempton cites studies that show that in areas where there is a lot of noise pollution, people are not as nice to each other. 

I’ve noted three daily sounds where I live that I can’t control - the sound of traffic (which is low and doesn’t bother me), the sounds of birds (which I love), and the sound of machines, mostly lawn equipment (which seem to drown out everything else and I find quite annoying). There are times that I retreat inside because of the noise pollution. 

Seeking Silence

The musician John Cage was a proponent of loving all sounds, even that of machines and traffic. He welcomed it all as part of the symphony of life. I see the value of not trying to change what you can’t control, but I also see value in seeking and even creating what Hempton calls “sanctuaries of silence.”

“Silence is not the absence of something, but the presence of everything.” - Gordon Hempton, Founder One Square Inch of Silence

One way to counteract noise is by seeking silence. But, as Gordon Hempton attests, silence is not the absence of sound, but perhaps the absence of what we consider noise. Quiet places are those with an absence of noise, not sounds, and they are becoming endangered. Hempton calls these kinds of places “sanctuaries of silence.” The root of the word sanctuary means a holy place or holy ground. 

When my husband and I visited the giant redwood forests in northern California, it was an awe-inspiring experience of sight and sound and we were a part of it. Although this particular area wasn’t remote – there was a road through the park – on this particular day it was pouring down rain. There were few people driving through the park that day. When we got out of the car, we could clearly hear the natural sounds of the forest, including the rain pouring down. It was definitely a sanctuary of silence. 

While these places are rare in today’s world, we don’t have to go to the wilderness to seek our own sanctuary. We can find them right where we are, whether in a forest, a church, or a quiet room in meditation. In his book, A Path of Encounter, Jon McAlice recommends finding pockets of silence in your day, whether sitting in meditation or looking out the window or finding a quiet place in nature or in your backyard to sit quietly. He says to let the sounds wash over you, letting go of any thoughts that arise internally. Neither listen nor not listen; neither see nor not see. Just feel the quietness and peacefulness. Or, in your daily life, refrain from speaking without withdrawing from a conversation. There are many ways to be silent and to experience silence.

If you’re going through a stressful time – whether due to your job, raising children, grieving a loss, or just general anxiety – with little personal time, I understand that this may seem impossible. But, finding pockets of silence may be just what you need. 

Are you afraid of silence? It can be scary if you’re not used to it. Some of the kids who came to the Peace Learning Center lived in the city and they’d never experienced the silence of the forest. It scared them. But, silence triggers listening - to others, yourself, or the natural world. It is a space where something can emerge. 

At a writing retreat led by Natalie Goldberg, we spent much of each day in silence, in order to experience the reality of the moment, including our own thoughts. We had to face the discomfort, the uncertainty and perhaps even unacceptable conversations or thoughts. Everything went down on the page. I’d never done anything quite like this before and, although I welcomed the challenge and adventure, it was also somewhat terrifying. What came out of this silence? A deeper experience of the place, in this case the retreat Center in Santa Fe, and also a few surprising aha’s about what was really on my mind. 

Listening with Eyes, Mind, and Heart

“I think what I enjoy most about listening is that I disappear.” ~ Gordon Hempton

How do you listen with your eyes? As David Abram says, seeing allows you to see the outer surface of things; things not spoken aloud. Noticing body language, movement, and gestures, is another way to listen. These unspoken things provide context to the sounds we hear.

The mind also plays an important part in listening. First, are we thinking instead of listening or are we bringing preconceived thoughts, ideas, or judgments to the listening? If we’ve already got our mind made up about what’s happening, we’re not really listening. True listening lets go of thoughts and ideas and hears only what is being expressed in the moment. Second, are we giving our undivided attention with our mind to what is being expressed? Or, are we distracted by external sources, including our phones? 

And finally, the heart plays a part in the listening equation. True listening feels what’s being expressed emotionally beneath the words or gestures. It creates empathy, allowing the other to be seen and heard and felt. Can we restrain from speaking or coming to judgment too quickly? Can we let others speak without interruption? Allowing silence in a conversation or relationship gives time for reflection or the other the opportunity to say more.

Synaesthesia

Another intriguing topic related to listening is that of synaesthesia, or cross-sensory perception. Are you one of those rare persons who can see sound? Apparently, one out of 100 people have this special skill or trait (it’s not a disorder). Some hear or smell colors or shapes; others see or taste sound. In other words, stimulation of one sense leads to experience in a second sense. These people have stronger connections between the language and color areas of the brain. As a result, they tend to have better memories (and perhaps see more clearly in the moment). 

Poet Mark Doty thinks this trait is not so strange. He says in his book, The Art of Description, that “there’s little boundary between, say, tasting and smelling, and sight and sound and touch fuse together every moment to form the sensorium, the sphere of perception in which we dwell.” In other words, we really can’t separate our sensual experience. To listen well means paying attention to all of the senses. I believe that we can all expand our sensory awareness and be more present to our moment by moment experience.

As a teacher, Cara Zimmer (via The Isolation Journals) does just that, asking her creative writing students to write about “the sound of a color, or the way a smell feels on our skin.” It requires some imagination to do this if you’re not naturally synaesthetic, but it’s a great way to practice moving beyond our normal experience. One prompt she shares is that of choosing a sound that you love and writing about the color and shape of the sound. How does it smell, taste, feel on your skin?

For example, the mourning dove’s plaintive call, for me, is the color blue. It rolls in and out like ocean waves, smells like a warm bath, tastes like a glass of whiskey, and feels like grief.  

Listening to Others

When we listen to other people, it’s usually in the form of conversation. Poet and writer John O’Donohue speaks beautifully about “conversations that sing in your minds for weeks afterwards.” When you have a conversation where you truly listen to the other and respond accordingly, both of you are transformed in the process. 

I’ve had these kinds of conversations, with close and trusted friends, and they are food for the soul. In this polarized landscape of social media and sound bites, real dialogue is often missing in action, and I know I’m a little hesitant to engage when there are differences. Yet, it’s only through deep listening and courageous conversations that problems get solved and change happens. 

O’Donohue’s friend and fellow poet, David Whyte, speaks about the conversational nature of reality, in that we are always conversing through our interactions with people, the more than human world, and the events of our lives. But, what is the quality of those conversations? And, how can we begin to have better conversations? 

Whyte suggests asking beautiful questions, ones that go deeper than “What have you been up to?” How about something like, “What”s lighting you up these days?” Listen carefully to the answer, leave room for silence, and then respond rather than react to what’s been said. This requires all of your listening tools - pausing, noticing sensations and emotions, seeing what’s really happening, hearing what’s underneath the words. 

Can you practice suspending your opinions for a moment and just say I hear you to someone else? Let’s all try to have more of those transformative conversations.

Listening to Yourself

How do you listen to yourself? I mean, really truly listen past all of the other voices around you? I believe that each of us has a core self, an inner teacher, that knows what’s right, not only for us, but for the world around us as well. This inner teacher lives beneath our cultural conditioning, our patterns of experience, and our desire to be liked and to fit in. They live beneath our fears, judgments, opinions, and beliefs; even beneath our likes and dislikes and interests. 

The inner teacher knows what we desire and what we most need. They know what lights us up and what is for the highest good of all. Sometimes this voice is quirky and eccentric, brilliant and creative, sometimes loud, sometimes as soft as a whisper. They plant and nurture seeds of possibility and inspire us to act. The inner teacher is you, unfiltered, and it takes practice to hear their voice. 

When have you listened to your inner teacher despite what others might think? Sometimes, you’ll hear this voice at the most unexpected of times. In 2009, I was listening to a podcast interview with businessman Seth Godin. He was talking about an online writing platform called Squidoo. I perked up, followed the inner prompting, and began writing on the site. Fast forward fifteen years and I realize that this was the beginning of my learning to write. 

Sometimes, acting on the advice of our inner teacher can be uncomfortable or scary, for example, when we have to say no and disappoint someone or speak up and take a difficult stance. Sometimes, it invites conflict and sometimes it means walking away from a relationship. The highest good in a situation is not always easy to bear. Yet, the price paid for not not honoring yourself is even higher.

You can begin to hear this voice more clearly by paying attention to your thoughts and what your body is telling you. Practice sitting in silence, with eyes closed, and notice what you hear, externally and internally. You can meditate or write down uncensored thoughts. You can notice what draws your attention and how that feels in your body. This is resonance – a vibration or energy that says “here is something that touches me and I need to pay attention.” 

Can you listen to your inner teacher and be brave enough to follow through on what they’re saying? By slowing down, pausing, noticing what resonates and not judging it, you will discover what matters, what makes you come alive and maybe even your mission in life.

Conclusion

As I was writing about this topic, a phrase came to me. Listen to the tenor of the moment. A tenor voice is strong and clear as a bell. Nothing obscures the sound. The tenor of a moment is the underlying thread or emotional undercurrent. Often, what and how we hear determines any action we take. Sometimes we won’t like what we hear but it’s important that we hear it anyway.

Listening deeply and well is a skill that can be developed. By listening intently, we’re truly present and open to whatever is at hand and this can have a positive impact on our relationships with other people and ourselves. Through learning to listen well and allowing time for silence, we’ll not only enhance our own well-being, we might just have better conversations and develop more empathy too. We may even become better citizens. 

P.S. There’s another part of listening not touched upon here, and that is listening to other species and the world around us. That will be the topic of the next post, for which this one laid the groundwork. 

Resources

The Value of Listening Exercises (Global Oneness Project)

Listening Exercises with David Haskell (Emergence Magazine)

Issue 2 of Emergence Magazine, has a 5 Part Practice in listening.

Courtney Martin, Listening in the Cracks (via On Being)