Listening from the Heart

 

Why is it that people don’t really listen to each other?  Oh, they hear one another, but not what’s lying between the lines and under the words, not the emotional content, not the things – unconsciously hidden or not – that the other is saying, not the “where is this coming from?” question we should all ask when someone else is speaking to us.

Not all conversations are fraught with emotional content, but all are driven by who the other person really is.

People often just want to have the “last word.” Or they want to prove their superior knowledge of the subject.  Or even humiliate their interlocutor with a “grand slam.”  Some simply reply with an irrelevant acknowledgement that words have been heard, if not really understood.

I have often wondered at the failure of communications between people, especially in personal relationships where the stakes can be so high.  Someone has to “win,” so the words of the other are barely heard.

I believe this is a product of our hurry-up western culture.  We don’t take the time any more to sit quietly and absorb what the other is saying, think about it a bit, and then try to offer some response that will further the discussion in a positive way.  Indigenous cultures do this.  They make a ritual of important conversations, passing a pipe, or a feather or noise-maker of some kind so that the one given the portentous object knows that it is her turn to speak without interruption and that all the others will really hear – and think about – what she is saying.  Then, in a very democratic way, the ritual object is passed to the next person, who may take quite a while in forming a thoughtful response.  In this way, important decisions of the group are made, and every participant is satisfied that he has been heard.

How did we lose this?

It’s a stress-filled world we live in, and all relationships – from the personal to the business – suffer for it.  I am reminded of when I was a young public relations consultant out on my own visiting my first referral, a psychological management consulting firm.  We had a cordial greeting in reception and went into his office.  I took my notebook out of my briefcase and prepared to make notes as we talked.  I asked questions.   We spoke, or rather the potential client responded to my questions, for about an hour.  And at the end of my note-taking, with a fair understanding of what was needed, I shoved my notebook into my briefcase and started to pull myself out of my chair.

“One moment,” he said. “Why don’t you tell me something about yourself?”  I’m sure my face reddened as I planted myself back in my chair.  I had no rehearsed phrases about my experience or expertise and I fumbled my responses for an embarrassing 15 minutes.  I learned that, in whatever relationship, the communication needs to open up in both directions, with both parties listening carefully.  My new client was a psychologist, and I was intimidated (I’ve always believed psychologists have this magical ability to see right through you), so I failed to remember that he needed to know something about me other than that I was a good, but shy, listener.

I later invited a man with superior experience into the firm – a creative guy, who was more entranced with his own creative input than with the client’s real needs or budget.  With my ability to listen, I was able to temper his impulsive responses, but the partnership didn’t last long.

All lessons learned.  Now I know to quiet myself inside when someone else is speaking – especially people I love – so that I can offer the most thoughtful, even wise, responses.  This has taken a lifetime to work on and get right.  And I’m in no way perfect.  I have just learned to leave my own little ego in the pasture while I really hear what the other person is saying.  And sometimes it makes me want to cry, because the process of listening from the heart, as well as the head, activates empathy – a precious commodity these days, and something every writer must cultivate.

© 2018, Sandra Shaw Homer

Photo by SSH

 

 

 

 

My Poem “Holding” Published in Junto Magazine

Holding

You place the heel of my hand
against your brow
so that my fingers spread out
over the curve of your head
settling down into your hair.
I laugh. Why are you doing that,
I ask. To hold the top down,
you answer. It feels good
To hold your head like this –
large and round like a melon,
you say, solid and field warm.
I want to be your head
under my hand, feeling held,
contained, all there. I am
both me, holding, and you, held –
all one, all the same.
Our bodies shift in the dark
and my hand slips away.
You put it back. We cannot
have enough of this oneness –
and, feeling it, we do not sleep.

© Junto Magazine, 2017

Junto Magazine, December 2017

 

“Writers Live inside their Heads”: Further Reflections

My friend Katherine’s thoughtful and provocative comment on my previous post deserves another post, not just a comment that will get lost at the bottom of the page. She makes a strong case for living from the heart, not the head. I certainly wasn’t trying to suggest that all writers are rational; for many creative people, quite the opposite case might be made!

There is no question now – science seems to be bearing this out – of the strong connection between heart and mind. The heart, in fact, contains about 40,000 neurons which help to regulate, by way of the limbic system, many brain functions. Fascinatingly, the experience of heart transplant patients suggests that memories and feelings are also stored in the heart (as well as throughout the nervous system). So the wisdom of the ancients that Katherine refers to was wise indeed.

Defining the role of heart in the creative process is a daunting challenge. It’s something we feel more readily than we can describe. The first time I felt it was at the piano – the Schubert Impromptu Op. 90 no. 1.  After almost 10 years of piano study, I played this piece very well, so well in fact that I felt I personally could bring something to the interpretation. But there was one evening when I was sitting at the piano in the darkened living room – with just the light over the keyboard – when I became so profoundly involved in the music that it felt for one magical moment as if Shubert were playing through me and I lost all sense of who I was; my heart was full. I now understand this as living in the moment – heart, mind and soul all perfectly synchronized with something much larger than myself.

Some would describe such experiences as divine, but I don’t think it’s necessary to insist on the divine nature of the human creative process. What we do need to recognize, however, is that without that capacity to get inside the moment – the moment of heart, if you will – our art will be missing an important component in our communicating with others; something of the potential connection between writer and reader will be lost.

© Sandra Shaw Homer, 2015

Photo by Marten Jager

Photo by Marten Jager