Feature Article - Listen Till You No Longer Exist

If you missed the last issue, please send an email to janine@syzergy.biz with February 08 in the subject line and we will forward the issue to you. This issue was titled "Life Doesn't Turn Out As We Expect" and was a personal look at how to deal with failed expectations as we move through the pages of our own story.

Listening is a complex art form, requiring senses that transcend the humble ear. Listening, like any skill, requires daily practice, ever and always moving towards the next phase of mastery, never quite within our grasp.

In its simplest form, listening utilises the sense of hearing. Be still, hear the sounds around you in the exterior world. The call of a bird, the wind in the trees, the sound of the keyboard as you type, the very low electronic hum of the computer.
Going deeper, into our interior, we might be able to hear our breath, our heart beat, even our organs moving, our stomachs digesting, or our body signaling pain, stress, or discomfort. If we really listen to our physical body, we will hear that it needs food, water, clothing, comfort, attention - even right down to the type of food and the level of attention. At this stage we have transcended sound and tapped into wisdom that comes from years of paying attention - or listening, to the finest subtleties. Few of us have paid enough attention or given enough time to the listening of the needs of our physical, emotional and spiritual bodies. We have lost, or indeed never found, the most precious connection we have - the listening to our soul; to the calling of our soul. Hence, most of us have lost connection to our very selves.

In the world of ~out there~ where our relationships are built, our work is done and our lives are lived, listening is one of the most fundamental of all of the essential skills. And it is a skill, to be learnt, honed, practiced, critiqued, developed. Listening is the partner of speaking, and together they make the whole of conversation. One cannot exist without the other. And yet our world spends more time speaking than listening. Do you? It seems we are afraid of silence, of stillness.

Conversation comes from Latin and means “the act of living with - to turn about with”. Conversation requires at minimum two. Either the speaker and the listener as two entities, or the speaker and the listener within a single entity. If I am in conversation with myself, often times I am speaking to myself - endlessly, without pause. Rarely do I actually listen to the words. Rarely am I still long enough to hear the endless and nauseatingly petty interior self chatter. My self talk lives so far below my conscious awareness, like the hum of cars on a nearby freeway, or the sound of waves when living by the beach.

Self awareness includes the ability to listen with acuity to this ongoing hum of words and thought. To catch ourselves in the inner conversation, to eavesdrop on our deepest darkest secrets, and in so doing surface them into our awareness. This is the very act of becoming conscious - to listen (and pay attention!) to our inner self at the deepest level.

Really listening to another is truly rare. Sure we can hear words, the story, and emotion. But to listen to another’s soul requires that we get past ourselves - that the conversation in our own head ceases, and that the only sound we focus on is the listening to the other. In order to do this, what is required of us is a deep and respectful intention to hear, to understand, to be present with the other, at the exclusion of our self. What is not required is to have an answer, look good, ask the right questions, be all knowing, be smart, or resourceful. Rather, to simply have the highest intention to hear YOU, be with YOU, understand YOU, empathise with YOU is the pure gift of listening to another at the level of soul.

Ask yourself when you last felt someone listened to you at this level, transcending all of their petty self issues of criticism and judgment in their overall willingness simply to hear YOU. Do you yearn for this conversation?
When did you last extend this courtesy of listening to another? How often do you and your significant others listen to each other at this level? Daily, weekly, rarely?

Our highest act of service in listening is to give up the ego part of ourselves. When we do this in our conversation with self, we give up what we want to hear, what we think we should hear, and all of our judgments about what is right, wrong, good and bad. If I am to listen and really “hear” my soul, I need to get past my incessantly noisy, chattering mind, past the conditioned thoughts, past my righteousness, and into the bedrock of “truth”. And yes, what I hear could be very scary. I have spent my life going right, and I may need to go left. The truth, no matter how frightening, will prevail in the end, and I can either heed it now, or suffer the days, months, or years of denial. In my listening to my truth, I will find my liberation, my ability to be aligned with how I live my life and all that I am.

How often do you listen to yourself with this level of attention? What would you hear if you did? Are you nervous about what you may hear? That your job leaves your soul cold, that your relationship needs intensive care, that your health is in dire straits? That you have lost connection with your spirit?

When I am in a conversation with another, listening until I no longer exist means to transcend my ego self in the conversation; to NOT have the conversation be about ME. I need to be able to get past all of my personal issues, my need to be right, liked, smart, good, nice. To do this, my focus needs to be entirely on you, and my deepest intention and desire to inhabit your world to the level of understanding and intimacy that will be profoundly felt by you. You, the speaker, will know that you have been completely heard, completely understood, and in the process, given absolute grace as the speaker. I do not need to agree with you, however, you will know that I have heard you at the level of soul.

“Forgetfulness of self is remembrance of God.” al-Bistami

Want to use this Article in your E-zine or Web site?
You can, as long as you include this complete statement with it: Syzergy dares to care about speaking the truth with compassion. We offer our complete flag ship program Dare to Care, into organisations world wide. We also provide Just in Time Coaching globally. If you would like to have your organisation be one where truth, compassion, respect and care work together, please visit www.syzergy.biz. Be sure to sign up for our free newsletter for more artilces like this one.

Resources, Tools and People We Would Love to Share

Many books have been read and loved in the last few months.

A simply beautiful book about life and living with loss is Elizabeth Lesser’s, Broken Open. This is the kind of book you have close at hand, to pick up any time to remember life’s beauty in tragedy. This will continue to be one of my most precious soul food books. Nourishing, poetic, and gently reminding me of the truth of my journey.

Another person who simply inspires me by her continued commitment to making a difference, Lynne Twist, wrote her beautiful book, The Soul of Money, sharing her experiences of being a fund raiser for 20 plus years for the Hunger project. This is the kind of book about money that I wish were more prevalent, looking at money as an opportunity for service to others, versus simply buying more stuff. Another soulful read.

The recently published book, Influencer, by Patterson, Grenny, Maxfield et al. is a great study of influence. How to get people to change. Practical and easy to read, a great resource for those of you who ever seek to get people to change.

Finally, Ervin Laszlo’s Chaos Point looks at the world at this critical time - what we face and what we simply must do. It is a call to massive action.

Where in the World is Syzergy?

We have been to Perth, and this month sees trips to Melbourne, Sydney and the Sunshine Coast, plus numerous trips to Brisbane.

©2006 Syzergy Pty Ltd    

Established in 1997, Syzergy is an international training and coaching company specialising in enabling people to speak the truth with compassion. Our flagship program, Dare to Care, has been delivered to audiences around the world, to great acclaim. Just in Time Coaching offers coaching solutions to organisations in ajust in time, innovative and efficient way.

Bring the power of truth with compassion into your organisation today!