Dear human friend.
This is step two of five to self-healing — for ourselves and the others and for our beautiful planet earth, Gaia.
Actively listen to the other
We can only understand the others around us, if we are really listening to what they are telling us. This means, we need to listen actively. Active listening is what happens with all senses. We feel, hear and see. And we listen from a neutral position, we are perceiving and not judging. The full attention we are giving to the speaker is recognized by our responses, which can be maintaining eye contact, nodding, smiling, or speaking encouraging words to allow the other to speak on. In the first step we have already made clear, that we are patient and have no expectations whatsoever. In these means the person across us can tell the story with ease as well as more consciously, openly and honestly.
Then we perceive. We allow pauses to happen and do not jump in with questions to break the silence, which allows the other person time to explore one’s thoughts and feelings, it allows space to create and grow. We remain neutral and in an observing position. We are not judging at all.
It is not easy to be the active listener nowadays, for we all would want to share the wisdom and knowledge we have accumulated ourselves along the way. Now imagine that a friend, a neighbor, a client tells us her or his story of struggling with life. We are longing to jump in with intelligent questions or with advice. This might break the magic moment of a beautiful relationship that was just about to emerge and thrive.
There is a difference between an open, perceiving, patient, honest, respectful, balanced relationship and a judgmental, impatient, imbalanced relationship. We are indeed wise and knowing nowadays. The fine line lies between sharing this gift with the others in a supportive way or showing off as the helper in a way that creates dependence. There is a fine line between help and support. Both might be seen as ‘offering a hand’. Still, helping creates dependence — you take the hand, grasp it, not wanting to let go from both directions, be it the helped or the helper. Whereas support enables one to walk alone — knowing that there is a hand if one stumbles or falls.
It is not always easy to leave our knowledge and wisdom behind. We have been through so many situations in life ourselves, we have done research and studied. We want to share what we know with our struggling opposite before we are asked for it. Active listening is no easy task. Silence feels like an invite to start talking ourselves. I have many examples of clients, with whom I have not maintained perceiving, listening, patient and stepped into an impatient, judgmental way to counteract. And the dynamics that have happened are clearly to be recognized — unhealthy. My client’s symptoms — pain and suffering — get better, for a short amount of time. Then the clients come back because they believe that I am the one who holds the knowledge on how to the solve their problems. We have allowed an imbalanced relationship to happen. My clients have the feeling that I have an important role in telling their story, the ownership is unclear. I have sneaked myself into their system and pretend to be of importance for their process of self-healing to happen. In this way I have become a dominant helper.
Luckily, I know now. And this allows us to start over.
Actively listen to yourself
Being really able to actively listen to others comes with the counter-notion: Actively listen to ourselves. If we are not able to hear us and to communicate with all our inner voices, we might never understand who we hear when we perceive. It is mine or the other’s voice? Are they mine or the other’s emotions? What are my own hopes, my fears, my needs? Who am I? We need to know to step out of ourselves and encounter the other person with complete readiness to perceive. I call it “sitting on a tree watching us acting”, the term is also called “Meta-Position”. We observe. We are in the situation and listen and at the same time we are not involved emotionally. Still, we are caring for the other. We are compassionate. We share what wants to be shared and yet we are not wasting our wisdom or knowledge as we know that our counterpart learns the lesson as if by itself.
Actively listening to ourselves, comes with many benefits. We connect with our inner voices, we resonate with our inner essence, we find peace from within. We find our home deep within us, we find love, we are happy with whom we are. Just by being. Acting through this very notion of self-love and consciousness for ourselves, makes us calm and allows us to be attentive to the other person.
I have once created a story for myself, which allows me to actively listen to myself and to find peace within me, to be happy with just being. I called it “My inner kingdom”. I imagine to be a country of this world, a kingdom. At the same time, I am the queen of this country and bear the responsibility for my citizens, which are the components that make me who I am, such as cells, body parts or emotions and thoughts. As queen, I bear the responsibility that my citizens can spend a prosperous life in community. I meet this responsibility by eating a balanced diet, moving regularly, avoiding stress, surrounding myself with people who are friendly to me, and participating attentively in life. And I have very well understood that I can do all that, because my citizens tell me. I actively listen to them. Perceiving and not judging.
With the beauty of resonance within ourselves, we can allow beauty of resonance around us happen.
Active listening is the key.
This was lesson 2. And it is the second step into self-healing by actively listen to the other and to ourselves. The space, which creates as if by itself, can now be used, in lesson 3, for forgiving.
With a deep bow. Princess Gaia.