Deep Listening | Ven Canda

Very good.

That was helpful for me,

I think,

Just to make it simple and be bodily based,

Because I've been very much in my mind the last few days.

That's fine,

Yes.

So I think we have the people who are coming and the people who need to leave early,

That's fine.

We can get in,

But so be it.

Sometimes we don't really understand why,

But that's just the way it goes.

So we've got a small group today,

Which I'm hoping will be conducive for some Dhamma discussion.

So first I'll just give a little reflection,

A few thoughts about listening and what it means to listen deeply,

And how that can really complement the practice and be maybe another perception we can have in the meditation to help us just settle back into more of a passive role in the experience.

Also to notice when we start to get a little bit too involved and start to judge what's happening.

It's a very similar sort of process that happens sometimes when you're listening to someone speak.

Part of you is listening to them,

And another part is listening to the commentary in the mind and the thoughts and evaluations about that or what we need to say next.

I just wanted to talk about different ways that we can listen and different areas of life that we can give a little bit more presence and attention to.

Listening is defined as giving attention to sound or action,

Which is quite interesting because usually we think of it in terms of sound.

It's kind of hearing and trying to understand another person's perspective.

Listening deeply really can heal relationships.

It can resolve conflict.

It can stop marriages from breaking apart.

Sometimes all people really need to do to understand their situation or get more in touch with their feelings is to be heard,

To be listened to deeply,

Just to be in the presence of another human being who can empathise.

Often I think when conflict arises,

It's because we're trying to sort of fix things.

We're trying to problem solve and troubleshoot before we've really heard the other person and really offered that presence.

I notice for myself that if somebody is interrupting me and sort of trying to resolve my problems,

I start interrupting them as well.

So it becomes almost like a battle to see who can get in there first.

And yet when I feel that I've been met,

I feel that I've been heard,

It's as though the kind of tension goes away.

It sort of melts away.

And then I can become much more receptive to the other person.

Just that simple acknowledgement that I hear you,

I sense your pain or I sense your joy.

And sometimes this can be through body language.

We don't have to say very much.

It's just a sense that somebody is there bearing witness with this sense of presence,

Curiosity,

And empathy,

Which I think is a really key factor in listening.

And I was reading about different types of listening.

They do talk about empathic listening as being one where there's a sense of mutual concern and we have to put away our own troubles and ideas and problems for a moment just to be with somebody else and give attention to where they're coming from,

Put ourselves in their shoes.

So this is a kind of connective type of listening.

It connects us to the other.

Other types of listening that are discussed are things called appreciative listening,

Which is a sense of enjoying something such as music or maybe even a comedy program.

Or appreciative listening could be listening to a Dhamma talk,

Being in a really passive role.

And then there's something called comprehensive listening,

Which is what we do when we're listening to a lecture or maybe a discussion and we're trying to understand a particular message that the speaker's trying to get across.

So this is a little bit more active again and I think relates perhaps more to insight practice than maybe a samadhi type of practice.

And then there's a fourth type,

Which is called critical listening.

And I think that's a little bit more evaluative than the comprehensive listening where we're trying to glean information.

The critical listening is listening to understand something and the ramifications of something such as a friend gets a medical test back.

I actually just got quite a complicated medical test with lots of results,

Which could have all kinds of meanings.

And trying to read that and evaluate it is a kind of critical listening.

And then making judgments based on that as what the next procedure would be,

What do I need to do in terms of restricting my diet or adapting.

But out of all these,

I think the empathic listening is apparently the one which heals relationships and can be most transformative.

And I think this relates more to the practice of meditation.

There was a study done by Harvard actually that paired speakers with good listeners and then other speakers with less good listeners,

People that hadn't been trained to listen in an empathic way.

And they actually found,

Which is maybe not surprising,

That the people paired with good listeners who were able to empathize and just hold space became less anxious,

More self-aware,

And had greater clarity about what their strengths and weaknesses were,

Which I find really interesting.

And they actually took this study a bit further and paired these people who were,

At that point,

Interviewees for managerial roles.

And they found that the people with the most distracted listeners,

So that means people who are maybe looking somewhere else or they're on their phone or reading a book when they're supposed to be listening,

Those people actually had a more skewed perception of themselves.

They actually felt themselves more suited to a managerial role,

Which I find really interesting.

It's almost as though because there wasn't a mirror perhaps or because they couldn't really unravel or become more self-aware or reflective about themselves,

They actually had a higher opinion of themselves,

Which is really interesting to me because that suggests that being heard also engenders a sense of perspective perhaps and maybe also humility because you feel safe.

You don't have anything to hide anymore or anything to defend.

So I find that really interesting.

I mean,

There could be all kinds of reasons for it,

But the main point is that listening really helps us to connect with ourselves.

And I think often,

For most people,

When you are going through a difficult time,

The most healing thing you can do is just talk to a good friend who empathises and who can say,

I hear that,

Without interrupting rather than speaking to somebody who can't wait to interrupt.

They call them sentence grabbers when their thought process is moving more quickly than yours and they finish their sentence for you.

I'm sure we've all experienced that and I know that I do that.

I'm guilty of that because my mind's pretty quick and sometimes I get frustrated.

Somebody's thought process is a little bit slower than mine.

But actually the onus is on the person whose mind is quick to give space and give time for the other person to really take that time to contemplate what they're feeling and put it into words.

It's harder for some people to do that quickly and especially if they feel that they have someone impatient without much time standing by.

And I have noticed from my experience also doing some resident teaching at Gaia House where I was in a formal role of offering an interview space to some of the personal retreatants.

I noticed in the first interview that there was a tendency not to interrupt but to sort of pre-plan my response.

So somebody would say something and I'd think,

Okay,

Let me remember that because then I can reply like this.

And I realised quite quickly that that was really taking me out in the space of presence and the space of empathy.

And if I could just have the courage to relax that urge,

Which took mindfulness of course to see it bubbling up,

But just to stay with the feeling in the body,

To listen to myself while the other person was speaking,

To listen to where these reactions were coming from and that impulse,

How that would arise in the body,

The impulse to want to interject or offer a solution.

And just relax that.

And it took a little bit of courage as well as mindfulness to just sit sometimes with quite a lot of silence before the person was ready to speak.

I noticed by practising this way,

I'd sort of introduce the person and say,

Well,

This is your space,

Take your time,

You can bring up whatever you want to,

Or if you don't want to bring up very much,

That's fine too.

And at first they would also feel a little bit taken aback by that,

Sort of aren't you going to ask me anything?

Like where do I begin?

But what I would tend to do is try to infuse a sense of kindness and warmth into the space through a practice of metta meditation or just through relaxing into my own sense of slight dis-ease,

Getting comfortable with that.

And when I was comfortable with that,

I felt that it was giving them the gift of being at ease with that too,

Being at ease with the silence.

And it was quite extraordinary as to what would arise.

People would start to discuss things they never intended to,

Or sometimes just raw emotions would arise,

Someone would start to cry.

And once they realised that was also allowed into the space,

It tended to resolve itself.

And I think often we try to put words to our experience almost to wrap it up,

To finish it off.

Okay,

I've got it,

I've defined it,

I know it,

I can control it in a sense.

Because when we label things in a sense,

We have a measurement on them and what we can measure we then can control.

But actually what I noticed too is that people don't want to be,

They don't really want to be controlled,

Certainly by somebody offering advice.

But it's actually much more healing for them to just get into that feeling that's underneath all the words and the evaluations.

It's something much more of a much more real.

I mean words can only ever point at part of the truth,

They can't really point towards the full truth.

And things get resolved that way.

Maybe the resolution is just in allowing an emotion to surface that you've been repressing for so long.

And that's it,

It's just an energy that's been repressed or a trauma that's still lodged in the body and that can be gradually unpacked given the time and the space and the safety,

The safe environment just to be met.

So I think this kind of listening is really,

Really valuable not only from the perspective of the one being heard but also as a listener to just start to check what it is that leads us to want to give this unsolicited advice.

And I've noticed for myself it's the sense of self wanting to assert itself,

Wanting to say I'm here,

I matter too.

Maybe I've got something that can fix you,

Maybe it's coming from a good place but part of it is wanting to assert my own wisdom or cleverness or whatever it is to be in control of that little bit.

And it's a certain amount of dis-ease with not knowing what to do,

With things being imperfect,

Being able to let things be imperfect,

Let things be a little bit messy.

Not everybody's happy all the time and it shouldn't be.

That would be kind of really freaky if everybody was going around with a big grin no matter what it starts to feel very insincere.

So we can let things be a little bit uncomfortable and ragged and I think it can be very healing when we can have that with another person.

I know for myself that the people I'm most at ease with are those who know more aspects of me,

What I call me,

But they see me in all kinds of states of mind and they're still there after all these years still listening.

So these are the kind of empathic types of listening.

And then I've noted down a few other things.

Oh yeah,

About the response.

I wanted to just talk about when we do respond,

That we do so at the right time and how listening to a situation can give us cues as to when that right time might be.

Rather than interrupting,

We might wait for a pause in the conversation when a person naturally feels like just stopping and letting it sit.

And at that point we can actually ask,

Would you like some feedback on that?

Or maybe just prompt them to continue speaking and say,

Tell me more about that.

How was that for you?

How did that feel for you?

Do you want to speak any more about it?

Or to add some sort of empathetic comment like that must have been difficult.

I imagine you felt like this or I would have felt like that in your situation.

Is that how it was for you?

So there's all these different ways we can kind of introduce a space for that person to continue to speak or to respond in a way that's not imposing.

And the Buddha talked about finding the right time as the first kind of.

.

.

There were five sort of checks that you need to do to have the right speech.

And the first one is,

Is it timely?

So this means,

Is the person ready to be spoken to,

Particularly if you want to give feedback,

Especially criticism.

So are they in the right mood?

Are they tired?

Have they just had a busy day and they'd like to relax first?

Or maybe some people like to speak and get things off their chest straight away and other people need a few days,

Which can be really frustrating if you're the one who likes to clear it up,

Which I tend to be.

But actually just to respect that that other person needs their time and they don't process things as quickly.

So is it the right time?

And then are we speaking from a motivation of loving kindness?

Do we have loving kindness in our heart?

Or is it coming again from a desire to kind of fix the situation or maybe some agitation,

Feeling that you know what's best for the other for their good,

Right?

But it's not really for their good at all.

It's just because you want to say it.

So are we really coming from a place of loving kindness?

And then is the speech gentle?

Do we say it in a gentle way?

If we speak with sort of loud words or harsh words,

It immediately triggers a kind of fight flight response in the mind where it was very softly spoken,

Soothing words can really calm a person down.

You see this especially if a person's having say a panic attack or just feeling really exhausted and stressed.

Just being spoken to in a soft and slow voice can really calm one down.

I notice for myself if I'm tired and I'm speaking with someone who has a very loud voice,

It can be really jarring on my mind because I'm already kind of,

It's like the nerves are on the outside and that voice just comes in and.

.

.

So I always try to like calm my own voice and give the cue to just calm down.

And then the gentle speech and the next one is,

Is it true?

Of course,

Right?

So are we really sure about what we've maybe seen or heard?

So again,

This is like where we can just ask that person,

Am I understanding you correctly or is the more you'd like to say about that?

I heard it this way,

Was that correct?

And then the last one is,

Is it beneficial?

And I think this is probably one of the most difficult because we often think it is,

But is it beneficial for the other person or is it just something that we need to say?

And I think when the Buddha talked about it being beneficial,

He meant is it really concerned with that person's deepest benefit with their progress on the path,

With the qualities of compassion,

With the qualities of gratitude and inspiration,

Is it really going to help them to cultivate this?

Or is it just fault finding and pointing out that person's faults?

Actually that can be quite disheartening because I think we do that to ourselves enough and often it's not that beneficial to keep on focusing on what's wrong.

It can be much more beneficial,

Even if you really must do that,

To sandwich it between two positive statements.

So you say,

Well,

I really appreciate this,

I see this in you,

I value you in this way and in the other way.

And this thing I'm struggling with at the moment.

So to put it in one's own language,

Like I am struggling rather than you are doing this and that makes me this because again,

That makes somebody very defended.

And then I also wanted to bring up another lovely sutta in the Majjhima Nikaya,

It's in the middle-length discourses of the Buddha,

Which talks about another way to give advice,

I guess.

I mean it could apply to many things,

Even just criticising other people or how to phase what we experience in life.

And the Buddha kind of contrasts two ways of doing it.

He said on the one hand,

Using the example of some of his teachings,

He says,

Some people would say,

Those people who indulge in sense desire or indulge in like wearing the body,

Tiring the body,

These are the two extremes,

Those people who do that are on the wrong path,

They've entered the wrong path.

So that's one way you can teach.

But he said that's not teaching according to the Dhamma.

Teaching according to the Dhamma would be to enter into the wrong path,

To practice indulging in sense desire or mortifying the body is the wrong path,

Leads to suffering and is not beneficial.

So do you see the difference there?

One was those people who do this enter the wrong path,

And the other one was to practice this and this and this way is the wrong path.

So it becomes depersonalised,

It's not about somebody doing something wrong,

It's just stating things more as a kind of cause and effect,

Like a law of nature,

If this happens then this is the result.

And this would take away so much suffering and blaming wouldn't it?

Because especially when we're in like political kind of conflict,

Which most of the world is most of the time,

And especially when we have very divided societies and lots of people voting for Brexit and other people not voting and you know,

All kinds of things,

Even with the coronavirus,

Some people are into sort of,

You know,

Getting back out into work and you know,

Not allowing the economy to suffer too much,

Other people are thinking more about how we can protect ourselves,

You know,

Would like to see social benefit systems in place,

Etc.

And it's so easy to start saying those people who think like this,

You know,

Rather than saying well this kind of philosophy could lead to harm in these and these ways.

So then it becomes less about the person and more about the actual view a person might have or certain attitudes to life,

Certain behaviours in life.

And I think that's very beautiful,

You know,

Because we start to talk about universal truths and give people space to grow into that without defining them,

Without saying you're someone like this.

It's so horrible isn't it when someone says you're like this aren't you?

You know,

And it's like well I don't know,

Maybe sometimes and maybe there's more to me than that but once you've sort of defined a person it's actually hard to see anything else.

It's really difficult.

You always notice that particular aspect of them,

That particular attribute that usually triggers you,

It's usually the things that trigger us that we notice,

Unfortunately.

But moving on into the meditation of course,

I mean we can start to listen to nature,

Listen to the nature around us and then listen to the nature that's happening inside.

Even today I was just walking in the park in Christchurch Meadow and I hadn't been out actually for two days,

I'd been really,

Really busy with lots of work for the project,

Admin and newsletters and all sorts of stuff.

And I got out into the park and just noticed the sound of my feet on the ground.

And normally I wouldn't necessarily notice that but I think there was something about needing to be grounded,

Needing to have that sense of connection with the earth.

And I started to really listen,

Literally listen to the sound and found it so rhythmic and so calming and soothing.

And of course from that listening to the sound I could also start to listen in a sense with my inner ear to the feelings in my legs,

To the feelings in my body and to the whole kind of movement which was very,

Like I say,

Soothing.

I think this is why babies obviously love to have rhythms,

To be rocked because they're in the mother's womb for so long,

They hear the heartbeat.

When they suckle at the breast then they hear the heartbeat.

So it's got that rhythm,

That sort of very soothing sound.

And all of life is rhythm,

All of nature is rhythm.

And we can feel that when we start to listen into the body.

I had this yoga teacher,

She teaches at Gaia House and she's one of the best I've ever practiced with.

Probably because she really does do the practice as a deep,

Deep listening within.

You actually practice with your eyes closed,

You don't make big movements,

Just very small and very aware movements.

So you'll be thinking that,

Oh,

This is a complete movement in itself,

But it's just one tiny movement out of a whole yoga posture.

So she'll bring you into one posture across sometimes a whole hour.

So every little micro movement is observed with your eyes closed.

And she has this lovely phrase,

She says,

Listen to the silence that is in your body.

And I've never thought of it like that before,

That there's a silence in the body.

And we actually listen deeply inside,

We're moving away from the realm of concepts and ideas.

And sensations don't have words,

They don't have language,

They just are.

They just are felt through a different part of the mind.

And there's a silence there,

Unless you've got extremely strong ears.

I mean,

Sometimes when you start to get calm,

You can hear your heartbeat,

For example.

So you might be able to hear some kind of sound,

But there's so much silence and stillness inside the body that we can tap into.

And this,

Of course,

Opens our perception up to subtler and subtler realities,

Because it's a skill to listen.

So much inside has to quieten down.

You know,

We're stopping talking back at life,

Talking back at experience,

Putting labels on it.

And we're actually starting to touch into something that's more real,

That has a sense of live,

Aliveness.

In a way,

You can think of thoughts and ideas as something dead.

They're something from the past.

You know,

They're concepts that we already labeled.

And sometimes by doing that,

We're no longer really open to how it's arising in this moment.

You know,

You might think you know pain in the body.

Oh,

No,

It's that pain in my knee again.

But is it really the same pain that you had before?

Or is it manifesting differently now?

Perhaps before there was more pulsing or sort of shooting pain.

Now you might notice the aspect of heat.

You might notice the aspect of a density or a sort of solidity there.

So these are all different aspects of the four elements.

We have the fire element,

Which is the main realm of temperature.

And then we have the air element,

Which is the realm of movement.

So there can also be like pulsing or throbbing.

This is the realm of movement.

And then we have like the earth element,

Which is things like lightness and heaviness,

Weight,

The spectrum of weight,

And also the realm of texture.

So whether it's rough or smooth.

Yeah.

What else is it?

Rough or smooth?

Dry,

Dry or wet,

I think.

Or maybe that's water.

There is another one for earth,

Which I forget.

But earth element is quite a large sphere,

Not quite a large realm.

And then the water element is a little bit harder to really feel.

And you can start off by just feeling the wetness in the mouth and then kind of sensing that same sort of wetness in the body.

Obviously the blood is the water element.

Or just the sense of cohesion,

The fact that the body is in one piece.

This is also water element.

It's held together.

And so there are all these elements in the body that we can start to explore,

Which become really interesting.

And of course,

The one nature that they all share in common is that they're impermanent.

They arise and they pass away.

The sensations come up and then.

.

.

They don't even just come up and then pass.

They come up and they're constantly changing.

You can start to notice what you think is a pain that arises and then after 10 minutes it's gone.

Actually,

There was a process there where it was changing in nature.

It wasn't really pain.

Sometimes you can even start to enjoy your pain this way because it gets so interesting.

You can really get inside it.

You just don't label it pain anymore.

And once that label goes away,

There's a lot less of a mental reaction to it.

I mean,

I've sat through really long sittings.

I won't even tell you how long in Burma because that was the practice we used to do.

And there'd be times during those really,

Really long sittings after a few hours that you just reach an absolute peak of complete agony.

But it was because your mindfulness had been built up,

Built up,

Built up through those previous couple of hours.

You were in a place of real equanimity and it was just fascinating to observe it.

I could really observe it like waves coming up and reaching the crescendo and then having to subside.

And after many hours sitting through that,

It would all kind of have dissolved and the body would feel incredibly light.

I mean,

When I talk about this,

It's just as an illustration because I wouldn't recommend this practice,

Especially not if you're not with a trained teacher and you've built up to this across many years.

I mean,

I also no longer kind of make a determination now for how long I'm going to sit.

It's just not what I'm doing.

It's not the way that I'm practicing now.

But at the time it had benefit.

And it definitely,

In a way,

Pulled the rug out from under what in Buddhism we sometimes call Mara,

The sort of aspect of the mind that tries to kind of freak you out or frighten you or make you react and make you think,

Ah,

Something here is in danger.

My body's going to kind of die or I'm going to die.

And this is just kind of fear that come up,

Fears that come up.

And when you're actually able to be with that,

You realize,

Hmm,

Actually this is quite interesting and it's not really threatening.

And then of course,

I think another way of listening for me that I wanted to share was just how to listen at the beginning of your practice when you actually sit on the cushion and to just check in with yourself and see what kind of state of mind you're in and what's needed in this particular meditation session.

I mean,

Obviously in a session like this,

We have to do some kind of guidance.

Obviously we don't have to,

But generally there's some kind of guidance.

So everybody's doing roughly the same thing.

And I tend to feel that the body's a great place to start simply because it is taking you into the very sort of,

Into the present moment in an experiential way.

But sometimes when I sit down to practice,

I check out,

First of all,

What's happening in my mind.

Like what kind of hindrances are present?

Is there some irritation or some maybe depression or low mood?

If so,

Maybe metta practice would be helpful,

You know,

Just to soothe the mind,

Just to act as an antidote to that sort of irritation.

Other times maybe there's tiredness,

Weariness,

And I don't want to do a very active practice like metta.

Or even scanning the body might feel like too much.

So I might just want to go into more of an open awareness,

You know,

And just really take the time to relax,

Just see it as a rest for the mind.

On the other hand,

Sometimes the mind can be kind of dozy,

You know,

Really dozy,

And you want to arouse mindfulness a little bit more.

And at that time it might be good to do a body scan and get kind of really into the sensations in a bit of detail.

So there's all these kind of ways that we can listen to our minds.

And when we respect the feedback,

You know,

I think respect is a big part of listening,

Giving respect to what the body feeds back to you and the mind feeds back.

And actually honor that and allow the mind to do what is needed.

We have a lot of intuition,

You know,

That we rarely tap into.

And I think it can be helpful to allow yourself to trust,

You know,

The feedback that your body and mind give back.

And then also,

You know,

Understanding which states are to be pursued and which are not.

That also takes a little bit of listening with discernment.

Maybe this is where we're moving into the sort of evaluative listening and recognizing,

You know,

That some states of mind are worth cultivating and some need to be just let go of.

Yeah,

This is an aspect of right effort,

That we cultivate the wholesome states.

We make much of them.

We develop them and maintain them.

And the unwholesome states that maybe sabotage our peace,

Sabotage our happiness,

You know,

Like anger or any sort of train of thought that's just taking you down a kind of hole.

You know,

It's not leading you anywhere productive or beneficial.

For those things,

We have to restrain them,

Not entertain them.

Yeah,

Not push them away,

But not give them too much emphasis or energy.

And so this also takes listening,

But that discerning wisdom in knowing what is worth cultivating and what is better to let go of.

And I think listening as a passive sort of mode in meditation is really helpful when it comes to breath meditation because this is a kind of more refined practice.

And sometimes we take hold of the breath with too much force.

The breath is very gentle and delicate and we come in with quite a coarse mind and try to grab onto it and keep it there.

And the fact is you can't do that with something so delicate and so refined,

You know.

It's sometimes barely discernible to the mind,

Especially if the mind is fairly gross and,

You know,

Agitated.

And so it will take a lot of force to be with the breath simply because you're not ready for it.

Whereas if we can get into this mode of passive observation early on in the process and just allow the mind to settle through being with the body,

Through cultivating a little bit of loving kindness,

You know,

Making sure our mind is reasonably easeful and quiet,

In that kind of state of mind we can then invite the breath in.

And rather than sort of say,

Right,

You have to stay with me now no matter what,

We can just give it that lovely listening presence as though a very dear friend has come.

And you just want to get to know how they are.

You know,

The breath isn't going to tell you how it is,

It doesn't speak.

But you can listen to the breath and find out is it long,

Is it short,

You know,

Is it rough,

Is it smooth,

Is it maybe a little bit catching in the chest because you're agitated or,

You know,

The energy is not flowing yet.

You know,

So really listening with empathy is very different from trying to control the breath through force or then trying to make the breath long or short.

This is not the instruction,

The instruction is just to know.

Yeah,

And knowing can only really happen in a quiet mind.

So this kind of quiet,

Compassionate presence is so,

So helpful for breath meditation.

And of course through that,

You know,

We start to see deeper and deeper into the reality of things.

The more the mind can quieten down,

The more chance we have to really penetrate the deeper truths which are subtler yet.

And I really like that phrase,

The beginner's mind,

Because when we think we know what we're looking for,

We think we know things like impermanence and suffering and non-self.

We may have read a lot about it,

You know,

We may have been to all kinds of talks and be able to kind of argue with the next person using the suttas or the abhidhamma.

But this kind of expert's mind is sometimes not receptive to what's arising in the present moment.

You know,

It's like you have a cup which is already flowing over,

You can't get more water in that cup,

Whereas when you have an empty vessel,

You're receptive,

You're able to take in whatever comes.

So we always have to keep hold of this beginner's mind,

You know,

Just keep on showing up as though it's the first time you've ever meditated.

I liked what Jaya said one week,

She said breathe in as though it's the first breath you've ever breathed.

You know,

This kind of thing really keeps the mind fresh and involved and curious.

Yeah?

And in the same way that you do with a person,

You know,

You may have had a best friend,

I've had a best friend for 41 years.

We were born in the same town,

In the next room to each other in the hospital,

Two days apart.

Soon we're both going to be 45 in the next couple of days.

And I've known her so long,

I can't imagine life without her.

But whenever we meet each other,

It's like meeting each other fresh.

And I don't know why it's like this,

Maybe it's just one of those kind of miracles,

Or one of those really deep blessings that one has in one's life.

But I really feel that we,

Although we're so tuned up,

We don't own each other.

We can let each other be,

There's no desire to possess.

And this is the other aspect of listening,

You know,

It's when we feel we want to own a person,

We want to control,

We want to assert our sense of self,

We're no longer receptive.

You know,

And just in the same way with a person,

Or even with an insight in meditation,

When we want to own it and say this is mine,

I've got it now,

This just increases our sense of self.

Sometimes people say,

Oh,

I have this beautiful state of loving kindness,

Or of like,

I don't know what people call it,

Cosmic awareness,

Or whatever.

And this is the real me,

This is my true nature.

And it can be so tempting to feel that way.

But you see how we want to own these things?

We want to make them ours.

And as soon as we do that,

As soon as we claim that and say this is it,

This is the truth,

This is the real nature,

We're losing that capacity to listen,

We're losing the capacity to go deeper into places we haven't yet heard.

So listening is almost like an active process,

It deepens and it deepens,

And I think there's never anything we can't listen more fully to,

Including ourself.

When I went for the first time to Perth for the Rains Retreat,

I said to Ajahn Brahm,

Are there any books I should read or that you'd recommend?

And he said,

Read the book of your heart.

And that was just so beautiful.

And that's really what this practice is about,

Just reading the book of our own heart.

So I want to end by just giving a little quote.