• Listening with the Soul

At times, I do really think I could learn to listen better; to quiet my mind, listen with my *being*, and be still, allowing the person speaking to access the deepest part of who she or he is while talking to me.

From that place of stillness, I can listen with my soul and hear the meaning behind the words -- and reflect that back to the person who is speaking, thus allowing him or her to perhaps gain a clearer vision of the situation at hand, and a greater understanding of it as well.

Meister Eckhard Tolle puts it best, so I'll keep my part of this post brief and wrap up with his words.

Peace, all.

True listening is another way of bringing stillness into the relationship. When you truly listen to someone, the dimension of stillness arises and becomes an essential part of the relationship. But true listening is a rare skill. Usually, the greater part of a person's attention is taken up by their thinking. At best, they may be evaluating your words or preparing the next thing to say. Or they may not be listening at all, lost in their own thoughts.

True listening goes far beyond auditory perception. It is the arising of alert attention, a space of presence in which the words are being received. The words now become secondary. They may be meaningful or they may not make sense. Far more important than what you are listening to is the act of listening itself, the space of conscious presence that arises as you listen. That space is a unifying field of awareness in which you meet the other person without the separative barriers created by conceptual thinking. And now the other person is no longer "other." In that space, you are joined together as one awareness, one consciousness.

- Eckhart Tolle

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