At 40, my hearing is regarded as perfect. But have I spent my life really listening?
I have realised that I spent most of my life hearing only what I chose to hear – an impediment that arose out of my choices, those same choices that also, as it happens, affected my eyes when I chose to ‘see’ only that which I wanted to ‘see’.
The relationship between the two senses was not always apparent. The sympathetic and correlating self-imposed limitation of the two senses was in fact the consequent result of another impediment; the avoidance of allowing myself to feel what I was already, at a deeper level, naturally feeling.
It was only through developing a willingness to allow myself to feel, that came with that a deeper understanding, that in turn reveals what is there to really hear. When my hearing is not filtered by habitual reactions I am able to listen and understand what there is to feel – and thereby cease to substitute that fear of feeling with noise of distracting activity.
By this choice to open up and allow this level of realisation, I was offered by that willingness to being open, the opportunity to really ‘hear’… that is, to hear by feeling with my natural expression without fastening onto the altered residual echo of the distorted reception of the distracting activity.
Feeling and hearing are not always readily associated senses, at least not in the strictest sense of the word. Vibrations are of course a feature of sound and can be felt. When I allow myself to feel and hear, it simply opens up a truth – a truth I have at times practiced hard to avoid. For me, there is an immense sense of loss in knowing that I have not connected to or met others in my true expression. Instead I sought to communicate out of and through my habits, beliefs and fears – and not out of what my body and senses were revealing to me.
In this regard and by that measure, most of us are afflicted with the inability to really feel and therefore communicate. It was therefore a big shock to realise that I was only using my senses to react to my environment and that my communication was merely used as a method of ensuring that I remained shrouded in that generally accepted feedback loop otherwise known as ‘socialising’: that group creation and often false space which feels comfortable simply because others are also there providing that recognition, comfort, acceptance and the apparent security found amongst the company of others… the collective and erroneous belief that the capture group is the ‘best’ or ‘right’ group.
… Until this illusion was shattered for me! Undone without any great difficulty. And all it took was a level of trusting that connection with myself. It was with Universal Medicine that I was reintroduced to the connection that I have always known. That is, I already knew and had always known what it is to feel and understand and really listen…
Up until this time I had chosen to trust the outer influence over that Inner Knowing – I allowed a division of the self by separating the feeling from the listening and so avoided truly hearing, and this can never stand because that division requires outer reinforcing by way of identifying with the distracting activities. For me, losing trust in feeling the self is the same as abandoning the self – it cannot be reconciled – it must be reclaimed.
Those times of anxiety that I had felt in social interactions that I had railed against were in fact the very things that were prompting me to feel. The anxiety was a tension, alerting me to the fact that I had separated from living my essence of who I am. For me to be really listening with that aware, attentive, receptive communication merely required stillness of presence. And Presence means exactly that – being present in and with my body – and never shrinking from that awareness. In this way I have then been challenged to honestly look at the heavily invested beliefs and ideal constructs that form my perceptions.
It is only through feeling that I can paint an honest self-portrait – warts and all! For me the process has merely been a stepping out from the shadows and leaving behind what is not truly part of me. I know that I am infinitely more than a mere reflection of my environment; I can now see that I’m not the adopted emotions and behaviours that I have been living with. I can reclaim that space I abandoned when I withdrew from my real expression.
I have started to really listen and truly hear without the anxiety that I once had of being lesser, or that arrogance of being greater, because that space, time and energy given over to the need for recognition or comparison has been reclaimed – or rather, it is no longer required. I need only feel to know a truth because by first understanding through listening reveals truth – much faster than seeking understanding through the slow process of acquired and therefore dated knowledge.
Instead of communicating from a choice to express, I observe that many of us have become puppets to a mass market; communicated to collectively, through a media that advertises instructions on how one should feel, what one should believe in and on what is normal (for the fashionable now). For example, our news seeks more to stir up reactions than it does to inform on actual events or encourage open discourse, and the young are fed instruction on style and behaviours that promote and benefit the consumer markets.
There is a discovery to be made; without choosing to first feel, there is only the appearance of choice. Situations where individual feelings are left to a collective and fashionable emotional response, where those responses are made without feelings, are merely derivatives.
It is in this way that the cause and effect are reversed, because when we feed from this global menu of stimulation, with its predictable reactions and encouraged addictions, habits and belief constructs, our interactions then amount to nothing more than an attempt at avoiding what it is to feel. And that is not living, it is cutting off at the source our individual gift of expressing uniquely.
We are now, most of us sadly not expressing in any unique way; many of us have instead become clichés – predictable, manageable, exploitable and ordinary. We have, for the most part, chosen to uphold collective false ideals that serve and seek to benefit none but those who profit from those beliefs: we have allowed ourselves – our essence – to be driven by external needs and to be valued only by our external deeds.
We may be hearing – but are we really listening?
By E. Walsh, Australia
Related Reading:
‘Seeing is Believing’ and ‘Believing is Seeing’
This is such a meaty blog as there is so much to explore. Lets start with
‘I have realised that I spent most of my life hearing only what I chose to hear – an impediment that arose out of my choices, those same choices that also, as it happens, affected my eyes when I chose to ‘see’ only that which I wanted to ‘see’.’
I feel we have been completely blindsided when it comes to our senses we have learnt from an early age to project what we want to see and hear which isn’t the same as seeing and hearing everything regardless of what is occurring. Everything is a vibration we are made up of molecules; the space around us are molecules we could say we live in a soup like consistency that we call space and this ‘soup’ vibrates, but do we vibrate within a harmonious tone which resonates with the rest of the Universe or do we vibrate in disharmony, which disrupts the flow of harmony? I would say for most of us we live in a disharmonious way and it is this that lead to illness and disease that is so prevalent in our society today.
This is a biggie for me, as my hearing has been affected from a young age and has continued to follow me as I’ve grown and needed the support of a specialist to this very day.
Just as you mentioned our senses are for more than their physicality, so the ears aren’t always hearing they are feeling too. Something I’m learning more and more about but also accepting that we more than our senses.
Our bodies are sensitive to everything around them, and are we truly using our senses for their purpose or for something else?
As I begin to get more familiar with living from my innermost heart, from my essence of stillness, what I sense is received very differently with much more information than when I am just relying on the five physical senses.
I agree Melinda, our inner heart is not the physical heart either. It is the centre, the pacemaker of our being, whilst the physical heart is the human part. When we drop to the inner self, then we are being of service from a different place. Then could we ask the question, would our bodies become exhausted from being of service?
“And all it took was a level of trusting that connection with myself.” The eyes and ears of the inner-heart know the truth.
Thank you E, for us to be open to true listening, as you have shared is to open our whole body to a different level of stillness so as another speaks we are not imposing our thought or a running a commentary over the top of what someone else is sharing.
I really get this – how I disconnect myself in reaction to what I am seeing or hearing, and I agree with you, it is me abandoning myself, my essence. This can be very subtle or not so subtle. Either way, this is a really weird mechanism in that if I really did not like what I am seeing or hearing that much, why would I let go of the dearest, most precious thing that I have got for something I so despise? This makes no sense.
Fumiyo I saw an interesting short video about the lies and corruption around the milk industry, that didn’t surprise me at all as we are peddled so many lies. What I reacted to was the way men where roughly handling new born calves probably males by throwing them onto a truck. How far removed from ourselves have we become when we can treat another in such an uncaring abusive way. how is it possible that the man throwing the calf into the truck has become so uncaring, when he himself at one time was a tender young child. Imagine the stress on the calf and the mother to be separated in such a way. How uncaring are we as human-beings that we do not care that the only way for a cow to produce milk is if she has just had a calf which is taken away from her, imagine the stress we put these animals through just so that we can drink the milk that she produces, because we have fallen for the lie that milk is good for us. How far have we fallen for the lies that has produced a society that is quite frankly so uncaring.
Yes, the observer of the truth of life and not the receiver of the lies that are being expressed.
We are so much controlled by our reactions on our senses instead of feeling what truly is expressed by what people say, what the media present to us and the movements that are behind these expressions.
I feel at last Nico that humanity is waking up to the fact that the media is corrupt and sells lies, I speak to many people around the world and with what is happening in the world currently it is showing everyone just how corrupt the media is and that they cannot be trusted as the medium is being used to crush and then control humanity. More and more people are waking up to the fact that we live in a very corrupt society which we have ourselves made by dulling our senses to what is really going on and projecting what we want to see and hear instead.
We cannot close our hearing like we can close our eyes so through our hearing we are in constant connection with everything around us and therefore when unaware very easy to influence by the unseen.
Connection with our body is key to truly listening to what another has said, or we become very selective in our hearing and are in our heads working out what we want to say.
The physical body separates clearly the senses. You smell through the nose, you listen though the ears etc. Yet, when you are able to connect deeply to your true essence and allow feel to lead the way, you realize that it is your whole body that does the seeing, the listening, etc. And what comes to you, does not come through the usual ways.
So true – what we like to avoid feeling is often the very thing we really should pay attention to.
‘We may be hearing – but are we really listening?’ So true, we often only hear what we want to hear at times, listening with our whole body we can remain still and feel and hear what is being expressed without the self getting in the way.
Anna I have noticed that I only hear what I want to hear, this is very apparent when I re listen to say an audio of Universal Medicine, it may have been recorded some years back and when I re listen to the words there is so much more I can hear, I keep saying to myself I don’t remember hearing that. As you say when we get ourselves out of the way it opens up the flood gates to feel and sense everything.
What we do not choose to hear or see will sooner or later become unavoidable so why delay let’s open our eyes and ears today – who knows what we have been avoiding might just be the very thing we have always been looking for!!!
Our interfering mind tries to control our communication in such a way that the truth about our existence is not exposed and that we can continue to live our wayward behaviour.
It feels like every cell of our being ‘has ears’ too. It is funny to consider maybe, but maybe each and every cell mirrors all the functions of our whole body – so they ‘hear’, ‘see’ ‘smell’ too. There is no doubt that sound can be felt and sensed. It is a vibration after all.
This blog makes a great point, being able to hear does not always ensure we are actually listening and understanding what is being presented to us – and this makes me wonder how much of the potential of life are we missing out on.
The only way to truly feel something is to listen and when we listen to what we are feeling from our bodies we are given the wisdom and understanding of what the truth actually is.
Lovely blog, thank you E. Walsh. I am reminded of a singing workshop I attended where the facilitator encouraged the participants to ‘listen with the ears of the heart’. What is shared here is what he meant by those words. And with that, I started to learn about a wonderful new realm of self-expression.
May I suggest that our essence cannot be touched but that it is the outer persona, the one we display to the world and posture and position ourselves with, that has become the puppet of whatever forces we allow to work through us.
We tend to think that our senses work on automatic pilot. Yet, the truth is that there is an element of choice behind every decision regarding them. What we allow in and what we dismiss ipso facto is up to us. By doing so, we construct our own reality, grand or miserable.
Could it also be possible that we listen with our whole bodies and not just our ears? I know from experience my whole body is a barometer for truth.
I wonder if it could be said that there are several levels to our hearing – so there’s what is actually said, then the intention or energy behind what was said and then on top of these we then have our own filters – such as what we want to hear, and how we’re feeling at the time (small, arrogant, frustrated, happy, sad, amazing) which I’m sure influences what we hear. There’s much more to it than we first realise.
There are many levels to hearing as there are many levels and filters to seeing. We are basically after confirmation of what we think it should be, of how it fits into our world.
Our body is constantly communicating but are we listening?
We see what we want and need to see (confirmation bias) as much as we hear what we think we need to hear – and that does turn us into functional and predictable units of an ideology, a religion, a sporting club, a culture, etc. In fact, we become its puppets as everything that does not fit, does not suit or contradicts the belief, dogma or ideal held is filtered out.
This is a great reminder to receive on January 1st but then again it is a great reminder to receive any day as each moment is a fresh opportunity to receive without any pictures or sounds from the past!
It is quite something when we open our eyes to just how much we choose not to see and our ears to what we are not hearing – thank you for the reminder to bring further awareness and presence to what I am seeing and hearing.
True indeed; our filters are there quicker than we think possible, they are our second skin, our protection and stalwart. Anything that doesn’t suit, doesn’t fit the preconceived image and upheld belief seemingly disappear before it even appeared – but we have indeed felt it, seen it, heard it an it doesn’t go away.
That is so very, very true it just gets buried. The only way to truly protect ourselves is to choose to see and hear things as they truly are – see how the word truth keeps coming in – it is all about truth.
Thank you E. Walsh, I appreciated the link you made between feeling and listening, and how vital it is that we feel what we hear.
Presence is essential if we choose to truly listen, great question to ponder on, ‘We may be hearing – but are we really listening?’
‘Feeling is Really Listening’ – So true E.Walsh, as we deepen our feeling senses we are listening to to wisdom our body holds.
Fabulous E.Walsh. You present how big everything is. Everything is not made up of just what it is we see – a ‘rushed reality’ to cover up the truth – hearing what is wanted to be seen – an already pre-prescribed picture giving to us what we signed for. Until we truly listen will we truly see.
To express uniquely, from the love in our hearts is not the normal way of living. Even though each of us know, that in truth, it is the only way to live.
Am I really listening, is a great question to ponder on, and I agree,’For me to be really listening with that aware, attentive, receptive communication merely required stillness of presence. And Presence means exactly that – being present in and with my body – and never shrinking from that awareness.’
One thing I have become adept at over the years is very quickly ignoring anything said that makes me feel uncomfortable. Its a lightening response but I am catching myself more often these days and then giving myself a moment to feel if a response is needed. It is sometimes a tad delayed but the more present I am with my body, the less delay there is.
It’s interesting that when you scratch the surface and start to observe your own behaviour, how much is revealed. I have up until recently been a very literal listener. I would only pay attention to the words, but since allowing myself to feel more, there is so much more going on than the words, and often they don’t match with what the person is saying. Saying what I feel is relatively new but I’m getting better at it as I practice.
After a week of having a blocked ear after reading this I feel there is so much more I could be hearing by connecting more to my feelings. I have for a long time and still do these days have an internal radio playing and this perception that I can’t handle my feelings. But in reading “I can reclaim that space I abandoned when I withdrew from my real expression.” I am starting to understand that this playing small and fearful is not needed. This will take time to practice but thank you for the inspiration.
Listening fully takes a commitment to detachment, to not being engaged from a sense of making it all about you, really listening takes understanding and a choice to see the bigger picture and the picture behind the picture.
It is interesting how adept we can become at only hearing what we want to hear, and being able to not listen to everything that is being said, we choose to either check out at those moments or just turn a deaf ear. I have now begun to understand the importance of listening to another and particularly the tone in which it is delivered.
Such a powerful blog E. Walsh, you expose beautifully how we don’t truly listen and we cloud what we hear with our own stuff. Learning to listen with the whole body is a game changer and allows us to observe another speaking without our own mind chatter getting in the way and this allows for a deeper connection where we can simply feel the truth and express this more openly.
Perception is perhaps the greatest obstacle preventing us from knowing the truth of all things.
What a powerful blog. We cannot truly hear if we have not claimed back all that we are. Part of hearing is our clairsentience, if this part has no authority in our body and has been pushed to the side, how are we use our bodies true intelligence to receive the truth of what is before us.
For sure E. Walsh, when we do not listen with our inner heart, we are at the mercy of the interpreting mind that allows us to hear only part of the truth and with that is masking its irresponsible way of living.
What a great expression ‘ Feeling is really listening.’ In other words we listen with our whole body not just our ears or mind. When we use our mind to filter what we hear we become mind listeners: the worst kind and means we’ve dis-connected (switched off) from ourselves and another person. I’m learning to discern between ‘ feeling what I know is true’ and ‘thinking I know all there is to know’
It’s far easier to think that life just happens to us, rather than take responsibility for the choices we make that affect our lives – yet there’s always a choice to open up, to hear and see more of what’s going on around us. Doing so means that we need to drop our guard and let people in – and let go of the hurts that might be standing in the way of this – but is so worth it, as life becomes far richer and more beautiful.
We only get out what we put in is loosely a term I have heard over the years that I never really related to life and yet here it is. As the article is saying, “We may be hearing – but are we really listening?” or what part are we listening too? There is so much sound around us, some not audible in the usual way as everything makes a sound even complete silence still has a sound, listen next time you have it. For me this proves that energy has a sound, a very defiant sound and yet we settle to hear only part of what is there. Once we choose that part then this controls our lives, our choices and our listening quality. We would like to blame all manner of things for how life is and yet here we have our choices controlling how life is. We are in this more then we care to remember and be aware of, nothing gets past us, we see, hear and feel everything it’s just how much we listen that controls the next part.
Recently I was at an Esoteric Yoga session and noticed how my hearing would blank out momentarily even though I was right there wide awake and I was wondering why this was happening – especially Esoteric Yoga primarily being about connecting and listening to one’s body. Your observation and sharing here feels very apt for me right now. So the question for me is – what am I avoiding feeling?
You have brilliantly exposed that trap we have so often fallen for – our quest for individuality which actually leads us to draw from a pool of predetermined and controlled consciousness, so we end up existing in a way that is not individual at all. From here what we see and hear is processed through our disconnected minds serving only to continue and satisfy our quest for individuality. Through our choice to not feel, to not be in connection with our stillness, our essence, our bodies we disconnect from that which allows us to know the truth. For it is through our connection to our inner-hearts we can sense the truth of any situation and know that this truth is in fact universal. As from here we then see, listen and respond through our bodies with unique yet universal quality that represents the truth of who we all are in essence.
When we have any identification, hurts, reactions, ideals, beliefs, survival needs or attachment to outcome in a situation we cannot see, hear, smell or taste what is truly before us. Letting go of and healing our issues and being there for all equally are key steps in regaining our true hearing and vision.
I agree Nicola, these are all the filters through which we experience the world and get in the way of us truly feeling what is in front of us. The image I have is of two ponds, one muddy, the other clear. Truly healing and releasing past hurt is the only way to transform the first into the second.
It is a great freedom to hear and see what is truly going on. It is also very healing for the other person to be truly met, seen and heard as it is something we rarely do with ourselves or each others.
It is quite a shock at first to become aware of just how much all of us are puppets and not truly seeing or hearing what is before us. When we start to open our ears and eyes there is in fact a whole other dimension and world of understanding available.
The process you have embarked on of stepping out of the shadows to leave behind what is not truly you and reclaim the space you abandoned when you withdrew from your real expression is deeply inspiring and a development we all need to embrace… for the latter only leaves us a puppet of our environment and in denial of our true potential.
This is absolutely brilliant EW and something I have been long working on. Thank you for the reminder. It is interesting because the more aware I become the more aware of how unaware I am or have been. Equally, the more I listen and see the more I hear and see and that exposes to me just how much I have not been hearing and seeing and how I am still only choosing to see and hear the tip of the iceberg in terms of what is truly there and available.
This is such a wake up call if we choose not to feel then of course we’ve already fashioned our senses to hear and see what we want or to fit into an image or ideal that we’ve bought into. We cannot truly see or hear if we do not fully feel, and to feel is to allow ourselves to embrace the awareness we have and to live and to live in a way that ensures we actually honour it. Otherwise we’re indeed at the mercy of what we are told, and this is not true choice; in fact the truth is if we choose not to feel we are choosing to be led, we are choosing to be irresponsible, and to be directed by the ‘choices’ we are given.
Yes. We can all feel life, it just depends if we’re willing to listen to what’s going on. And from my experience that means trusting what I’m feeling and not overriding it with thoughts. I like what you say about stillness, so true. In that stillness we can really open ourselves to feel.
From early age, we learn to use our body (and senses) to let in the portion that suits us and to protect and numb ourselves against those that do not suit the picture. Of course, the accepted portion is then labeled ‘reality’. It is this selected picture that then governs our understanding and actions. All come to us. The all come to us all the time. We choose to reduce it to what we are comfortable to call the all; our own version of it.
“We are now, most of us sadly not expressing in any unique way; many of us have instead become clichés – predictable, manageable, exploitable and ordinary. We have, for the most part, chosen to uphold collective false ideals that serve and seek to benefit none but those who profit from those beliefs: we have allowed ourselves – our essence – to be driven by external needs and to be valued only by our external deeds.”
How so very true and exposing of just how responsible we all at for the state we find our world in. To speak against the tide is not easy, but it is super necessary if we want to see changes in our world.
Hearing what we want to hear – and I would add – seeing only what we want to see. Thanks for this post EW. It is common knowledge that ask two or three witnesses to a ‘crime’ and they all report a different description and version. We may believe we are being honest, but are we truthful?
This is such a great question- are we hearing or really listening as the difference is immense. We have become so adept at multi tasking that many of us listen to another while actually doing something else -I find myself doing this but will be so much more aware now. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.
Thank you E. Walsh – this is gold.
When I hold back in expressing myself in reaction to the other person not wanting to hear or be swayed to shut up from the reflections of being shut out, I am first and foremost disrespecting myself, therefore all behaviors that happen from this choice would be dishonoring to others too.
We have all been there, not connecting to others in the truth of our expression, but this realization is gold. Which just means we can start right now and re-correct our momentum to be different. Expression is the best way to learn non-investment, as its true purpose is simply to express in truth and love without expectation.
When we tune in to the ears of the heart we discover what we have always been feeling but choosing not to be aware of.
‘most of us are afflicted with the inability to really feel and therefore communicate.’ I wouldn’t say we are afflicted with the inability to not feel, this is not true, we can all feel – we have simply chosen a lack of responsibility not to.
‘But have I spent my life really listening?’ We could take this much deeper and ask the same question ‘Have I spent my life really listening to my body?
There is so much of heaven to be heard when we stop and truly listen. Have you ever had a conversation with someone and certain parts really stand out, it may be a few words, but it is very clearly a message from heaven sharing something for you to look at in your life / life.
Wow. E. Walsh. This is very much a stop moment as I come to the end of your blog.
A stop to consider and evaluate the many changes I have made in my life when it comes to truly listening. But most af all a moment to stop and feel the potential of true listening that I am capable of. That which I have a sense of, a stop moment to fully accept that to have had the sense of potential is in fact a moment to truly discern why I have not choosen this to be my normal, and the gift of knowing exactly what is needed to make this sense the foundation of how I live.
When we come from our emotions, habits and beliefs we get caught up in the falsity of these emotions, when we stay present with and feel the bodies truth it is presented in its purity without identification or investment.
It all comes back to the energy we are choosing and aligning too: spirit or Soul that will influence what we see and hear. Each produce 2 very, very different views, thoughts, feelings, and movements….
‘ I need only feel to know a truth because by first understanding through listening reveals truth’. We are feeling and reading all of the time, but not totally aware of this fact because it automatically happens. What I am learning to do is to express what I am feeling/reading, then I have more clarity of what I have felt or read.
“Those times of anxiety that I had felt in social interactions that I had railed against were in fact the very things that were prompting me to feel. The anxiety was a tension, alerting me to the fact that I had separated from living my essence of who I am.” and that there is more there to be explored should we stop and allow that. I have had that anxious feeling many times in situations with others and it has always been because what I am feeling may be different to what I am seeing/hearing (eg, someone being nice when you can feel they are angry therefore not genuine) and instead of expressing what I am feeling I have abandoned myself through not trusting what I have felt and what my body is telling me.
It’s like we get a set of comfortable beliefs and a way of being that doesn’t rock any boats and we then only hear what supports that narrow view. I remember when I was young, being angry and dissatisfied with the way I saw people were living in the world and I feel that this was why. Then I seemed to join them. There is so much more to being in this world and so much more to our expression. The key is to listen and be open to what it is possible to hear and see.
We often hear only what we want to. It is hard not to get caught up in sensation and taken off on a tangent that takes us away from the truth of who we are and why we are here.
“Without choosing to first feel, there is only the appearance of choice” – this is such a great reminder. So true – how we deceive ourselves with the appearance of choice, and that is all because we are limiting ourselves from the infinite that is actually available to us, and I can feel how we equate the known as the comfort, and become hesitant to surrender to the unknown.
With the plethora of bombardments we are exposed to every day – from media sources, music, visual imagery and so much more – it actually blows me away that we are yet capable, if we choose to reconnect to the stillness and depth of presence that is ever there awaiting within us, of expressing in truth. And a truth that is universal.
The keys to being truly present with oneself and embracing a foundational relationship with one’s own essence, as shared by Serge Benhayon of Universal Medicine, have been invaluable in this regard – they have changed and re-opened my perceptions in life, and continue to this day and will do far beyond…
It is our birthright to be so open and aware. Our commitment to expressing what is of our own true natures, and thereby in harmony with all, is what our world desperately needs for us to rise out of the lost morass of empty expression that populates our airwaves, our media, and our ‘everyday’ and bring the richness, joy and truth we are actually all capable of.
“For me to be really listening with that aware, attentive, receptive communication merely required stillness of presence. And Presence means exactly that – being present in and with my body – and never shrinking from that awareness.”
Thank-you for your words here E. Walsh. You expose how greatly we’ve dulled and shirked away from the awareness we naturally have – choosing instead a lesser way of expressing ourselves and ‘taking in’ all that we perceive around us. And to what avail?
We are so much more… and your call to truly listen and embrace all the awareness available to us is one that is deeply needed.
Hearing and seeing from the heart has the steadiness and consistency that is not part of simply hearing and seeing via that one sense alone. By including the heart in my perception of life I know I can allow myself full information rather than only what has been filtered through either the ears or the eyes.
Thank you for a thought provoking blog E. Walsh. I particularly agree with the News stirring up our emotions and not really informing us or inspiring action.
It is truly important to understand that when we do not express from our inner most, we actually react to what is brought to us in a way we have learned how to give the expected and desirable response.
Hearing with our bodies is so much more inclusive and comprehensive. It is not just what was said but how was it said. Words need the body to confirm and connect. Words alone is just noise.
“And that is not living, it is cutting off at the source our individual gift of expressing uniquely.”
By striving for sameness in the outer we have lost our connection to the inner which, the inner, confirms in us the equalness that we are, uniquely expressing as a part of the whole.
Thank you E.Walsh for the clear testimonial why feeling is a most important aspect in our lives.
Thank you E.Walsh for sharing, this really is what life is all about “For me to be really listening with that aware, attentive, receptive communication merely required stillness of presence. And Presence means exactly that – being present in and with my body – and never shrinking from that awareness. “
“I was only using my senses to react to my environment and that my communication was merely used as a method of ensuring that I remained shrouded in that generally accepted feedback loop otherwise known as ‘socialising’” – this is so brilliantly put, and I so agree with you. There is this silent agreement where we hold each other down not to awaken from the reprieve of comfort.
Thank you for spelling out so clearly that unless we make the choice to connect to what we are really feeling then we are limited in what we can hear and therefore listen to. Although there appears to be a lot of communication going on in the current world much of it is empty of true feeling and therefore very few are really hearing or listening to each other and we are all the poorer because of this.
this is pretty awesome to read, and I feel I am coming to this awareness more and more lately. That so many things I do or want to see or hear are coming from my own need for recognition to be seen. And this isn’t the truth, as the truth is there for all, no one excluded. It is not individual it is coming from the one source that we all come from, getting this understanding and learning to see that all is not for me as an individual but for everyone.
Beautiful said Benkt, we are not individual but all connected as one. Possibly all the means we use to not hear, to not see, to not feel etc, are there to keep ourselves unaware of this immutable fact, the fact hat we are all connected and with that are in constant communication with one another in our search for love.
Some tremendous observations on how we have left our true senses in favour of a collective default. I loved your take on ‘socialising’ – ‘that group creation and often false space which feels comfortable simply because others are also there providing that recognition, comfort, acceptance and the apparent security found amongst the company of others’.
Thank you E. Walsh for sharing, am I really listening, the key is to be present with my body in all my interactions and really feel from there.
‘It is in this way that the cause and effect are reversed, because when we feed from this global menu of stimulation, with its predictable reactions and encouraged addictions, habits and belief constructs……..’ – simply said but profound in it’s exposing. We live in reaction to our environment. We are instruments – we choose the quality of energy passing through our instrument. The body is the master and if we are able to stay with our movements and bring the quality of true purpose, we will be forever free of the life of ‘reaction’ we are currently responding to. Thanks E.
Your words are so wise E Walsh. First you got us to consider that ‘We may be hearing – but are we really listening?’… and this led to the acceptance of the fact that ’Feeling is Really Listening’. Awesome blog.
Hmm hearing only what we want to hear, seeing only what we want to see is making me wonder what else we actually miss out on with all this selective hearing and seeing.
Yes great point Suse, we miss out on so much when we pick and choose what we want to hear and see.
I loved the last paragraph, summing up how are why not communication from a the feeling within can cause disruption, anxiety, wasted time and wasted resources.
Much is said in this blog and I think a re-read is in order.
“It was only through developing a willingness to allow myself to feel, that came with that a deeper understanding, that in turn reveals what is there to really hear. When my hearing is not filtered by habitual reactions I am able to listen and understand what there is to feel – and thereby cease to substitute that fear of feeling with noise of distracting activity.” I can feel how true this is – how we only take in what we feel we can deal with depending on what hurt we are attempting to protect. I can pinpoint those moments in the past where I’ve done this. Now I understand that there is a different way and that is to allow myself to feel what there is to feel knowing that at times it may be painful but that there is honesty in that and nothing can be buried only to be triggered later.
By re-reading your blog E Walsh I have realised that sometimes I still only listen with my ears. An example happened recently when I was in a hurry to leave somewhere and only heard the words of what a person said to me rather than feeling into where this person was coming from and truly understanding the inner hurt that lay beneath. In retrospect I can see how separating this can be, as it led to me making a judgement rather than offering her understanding and love.
Re-reading this blog again and enjoying the wisdom you have shared with us E. Having spent a large part of my life not really listening was due to the hurts I was carrying and being able to control a situation so as to avoid further hurt. Learning to truly listen to people has been a beautiful experience taking the focus off me and what I need and allowing for a deeper connection with another.
‘We have, for the most part, chosen to uphold collective false ideals that serve and seek to benefit none but those who profit from those beliefs: we have allowed ourselves – our essence – to be driven by external needs and to be valued only by our external deeds.’ Very true and confronting blog which I will have to read a few more times. Wake up time!
Recently I found myself in a situation where I recalled some details of a conversation but everyone else remembered it differently. I thought I was going crazy because I was the one who spoke those words, but nobody heard it, apparently. You have presented something very intriguing here – how our perception can be filtered or manipulated by our preconceptions and/or the lack of connection – something for me to ponder.
I have read your blog for the second time and still there is more to be revealed at further readings. Thank you E. Walsh.
That illusion of choice is really no choice at all, like wandering down a dead end street and then trying to figure out whether to go left or right!
At school it was a subtle but important difference – being taught to communicate from the intellect, locking myself in my head and cutting off the boundless information that is available to the body.
Yes Simon I totally agree. School was designed to get us to think only from our intellect, and never from our feelings.
There is a saying that we have one mouth, but two ears… so to take more time listening. Its good – and I like the encouragement to receive more… but the blog is spot on. It goes so much deeper than listening, as to feel what is going on is to pick up on every nuance instantly. We can all do it, but as with the other senses, have chosen to numb it. Its a great loss when we do.
Great blog, E.Walsh. You say it just as it is, clearly explaining that ‘without choosing to first feel, there is only the appearance of choice’, a choice totally compiled by a fabricated ‘global menu of stimulation’ itself designed to support us ‘avoiding what it is to feel’. Too right that this is amounts to nothing more than existence.
Perfectly put, Cathy: a fabricated ‘global menu of stimulation’ is in itself designed to support us ‘avoiding what it is to feel’ and can only leave us in existence instead of living our lives in full.
E Walsh – your comment – ‘It was therefore a big shock to realise that I was only using my senses to react to my environment……’ has triggered greater awareness and the realisation that this is what often happens for me. Thank you.
I hear what you say E and I too need more re reads to really ” get it”. I do feel that we need to be fully present in our bodies to understand where we are coming from.
Choices are everywhere, but our feelings are so much more powerful if we’re in tune with what’s a feeling and what’s conditioning.
“I was only using my senses to react to my environment” – this really stood out for me. I can relate to being perfectly able-bodied in 5 senses, yet filtering perception by past hurts therefore trapping myself in a loop of reaction. I agree with you, trust plays a big part in re-building this re-connection back to what we truly feel in our body. And appreciating and confirming myself and my choice each time I get a glimpse of love along the way has been very supportive for me.
It is not that we can’t feel but that we are doing everything possible to distract ourselves to not feel all that there is to feel. It boils down to choices and responsibility! This blog is so powerful that one read is not enough.
Wow what a powerful blog. I love the wisdom you have shared here. ‘For me, losing trust in feeling the self is the same as abandoning the self – it cannot be reconciled – it must be reclaimed.’ As from our connection to ourselves we know everything and we can feel the truth in our bodies. Rather than living in a reactive way, as again you have profoundly said, where ‘we have allowed ourselves – our essence – to be driven by external needs and to be valued only by our external deeds.’ – thank you for revealing how much more there is of us to live.
I am learning more and more what true listening feels like. The quality in the observation, the open heartedness and the absolute non imposing way of being with the other is beautiful and what is more it is never ever draining in this way.
Your blog E gives me so much to ponder on, I will come back and read it again with all my senses. It is only recently that I allowed myself to feel how comfortable some of the conversations I have are, how I cruise instead of truly express from my body and thus I am starting be honest and to share the truth that I know is there when I am fully present.
Thank you E for a super power-full blog, what you share here is so important and a great reminder for us all. To truly listen requires you to be present and still in your body – a work in progress for me but certainly a game changer and a beautiful way to develop true relationships with others.
We have lost our unique expression as we have homogenised our conversations to a point where we don’t have to feel to be seen to engage. Yet deep down there is a dissatisfaction especially with the disconnection from ourselves and by extension, with one another.
It’s time we ventured to have that connection/conversation and feel first so that we can hear and speak from our unique expression.
Not only do we listen without feeling but our responses are then made without feeling. Like the automatic response to ‘how are you?’ Well noticed E. Lots of profound things in here. I notice when I hear without feeling I misinterpret or check out. I wonder what that’s like for the other person I’m interacting with.
I know Emily! Well said, you really nailed it! We say things without truly checking how we are feeling, we say the lines that we have learned to say rather than communicate form the feeling that is within us.
“I have started to really listen and truly hear without the anxiety that I once had of being lesser, or that arrogance of being greater, because that space, time and energy given over to the need for recognition or comparison has been reclaimed – or rather, it is no longer required.” This highlights to me how claiming ourselves as equal to others allows us be in our body to truly listen. Thank you for this great reminder.
I have felt this loss too E, that for most of my life I have not connected to or met others in my true expression; it feels almost like I failed people. Pondering further, it was clear that as soon as I lost connection with myself, that is lost connection with my inner heart, it became impossible to connect with others, it became impossible to really hear what another was saying. However, these days I am living from my body (as opposed to living just from my head) and find I am expressing so much more and feeling so much more, and the more I feel, I observe how much more I am truly listening!
I agree so much jacqmcfadden! When we don’t express from our hearts we rob the world of so much joy.
Wow E. your blog is a true game changer. Many things stood out, but what was also a shock to me was the sentence “I was only using my senses to react to my environment and that my communication was merely used as a method of ensuring that I remained shrouded in that generally accepted feedback loop otherwise known as socializing”. Over the years my expression has changed a lot to a deeper and truer level, but I can still feel where I use the “socializing” communication out of comfort.
You make some very, very good points here that we can and should all ponder on. I’m about to start a instructor training course for work and it feels like this writing would be great to offer our group; there is a vast difference between what we receive when we listen to people and what is received when we ‘feel’ people – of course I mean listening with our body. What comes to mind is the communication of animals. It is nowhere near the ‘you say something, I’ll hear it, then I’ll say something’ that seems to make up the majority of communication in the world today. Sometimes animal interaction and communication is called complex. I say not. I say animals are using the senses they have available to them to express in their environments. Common sense tells me a wolf living for six months of the year in -20 degree environments and still absolutely thriving wouldn’t choose to have a complex communication system within the packs! People have much to discover about our true potential for communication and expression.
Thank you E. Walsh for your blog about listening and expressing, I know when I am in a group and start to feel anxious I have somehow lost my presence and the tension I feels shows this to me. I am slowly stepping out of the shadows.
Jill it is great you are so aware of what happens when you are in a group and feel anxious, staying with our body supports us to not let these thoughts take us over.
Thank you E. Walsh for highlighting the importance of expressing and listening from our bodies and not from our head, where there is so much to keep us playing small, anxious, being good or right. And as you have said, allowing ourselves to hear and feel, opens us up to truth and it just can’t get better than that.
I liked what you’ve shared about listening and feeling, the two go hand in hand. Today I was walking through the shopping centre, it was quite busy and I would usually have some conversation going on with myself (in my head) but today I decided to walk and feel. My senses were heightened 100% and it became very real all of a sudden, I am in an environment that is literally imposing at me from every direction. It brought back a similar perception I had when I was younger. I really enjoy experiencing those moments of awareness. Its made me consider why people would want to not feel.
Great comment harryjwhite, I know just what you mean.
Yes harryjwhite, it does feel we are all in an environment that is literally imposing on us from every direction, and you only become aware of this when you reconnect back to your body and feel from the body; so much awareness comes back, the same awareness we had as children… and perhaps that is why as children we stop from feeling because of the overwhelm that realisation brings.
Yes jacqmcfadden04, Harry makes an excellent point as thoughts can come at us from all sides and you can feel bombarded especially when you are not fully with yourself and have chosen to take one of them on, then that one feeds the next unloving thought and so on.
I know that conversation in my head so well… a total distraction from what is really going on around us, it cuts us off and one of the consequences is that time and/or experiences can slip through our fingers without us even noticing they were there.
I agree Simon! Its like the conversation is our own personal interpretation on everything, but really the truth is what is happening energetically.
Hearing vs listening is something we’re never really asked to stop and look at – so it is a strong topic to bring up and really be honest with ourselves about what we are choosing. It feels as though letting our mind dominate conversations means that a lot of the time we are just hearing not listening – and it is with true presence in all parts of our bodies that we truly listen not just with our ears.
That is such rich question. I feel the answer allready in your question. This comes all back to our choice – our power – to use our voice – feeling who we are – in order to be ourselves – and express from there to people – all of the time. I have been having great ears and hearing whole my life, but I have to admit and say – I have not been listening. My communication has been about: ideals, beliefs, predication, knowledge – a very concept and measured communication. I have been seeing this now, which I had not clearly in mind before, because I have chosen a different form of expression. Expressing from my body – of what I am feeling – not what I am told to say.
The gap that opens when I don’t first connect to my innermost, is filled with what the world wants me to sense, think or do. It happens with all senses: taste, sight, hearing… If I observe this fact, I’m already half way out of the trap. The other half is to consistently practice this.
Felix, I love how you’ve made this very simple; ‘The gap that opens when I don’t first connect to my innermost, is filled with what the world wants me to sense, think or do.’
beautifully said Felix and it is an important thing you highlight. If we are not fully with ourselves, what is not claimed within will be filled from outside and the quality of this will be determined for us by the world around us. I agree it takes awareness and presence to work with this and lots and lots of practice.
And I have to try really hard to fill the gap – its exhausting and unending. Quite different to just being me.
Very interesting to read this blog E. Walsh. It really made me see how much we are not expressing ourselves if we are not connecting to ourselves and feel first before we say something. What you said here: “Instead of communicating from a choice to express, I observe that many of us have become puppets to a mass market; communicated to collectively, through a media that advertises instructions on how one should feel, what one should believe in and on what is normal (for the fashionable now).” made me feel how it is in the world at the moment. Many times have I observed myself saying things everyone is saying without even feeling that way. Like the “That is just the way life is”, kind of statements even though that may not be my experience. Really inspiring blog to be more aware of these almost ‘programmed’ responses. Thank you.
You raise many important issues in this article, so many ‘cliches’, ‘beliefs’ and ’emotions’ within society. And by choosing not to challenge these issues within ourselves, I feel we do hinder our true feeling and ability to listen. And so many of us are not expressing our ‘unique’ quality.
Great Blog E! Recently I have discovered that anxiety blocked me from truly listening and feeling. The moment this ceased, and I sat in stillness, my capacity to listen and feel increased dramatically.
For me, it has been the need to control that has blocked me from truly listening, and which has many times resulted in me only ‘hearing’ what I wanted to hear (which often has been a pretty narrow bandwidth!). So on one hand, I would be saying “Yes I’m listening” but on the other not listening or hearing at all, totally caught up in what was happening for me, or what I wanted to happen. The more I am learning to let go of control, the more I am able to feel what’s being said, and in this I am learning to truly hear and respond to what is being felt, which is not necessarily always about the words that are being said….
An interesting read bringing to light a great lesson in true communication through true connection.
This is such a revelation, I can also feel that I will need to come back to this. To realise that I have used conversation, listening and all those social interactions to just get through (to what I wonder) rather than to really listen/feel the truth of things. This is an awesome subject to ponder on. Thank you E.
Thank you E. Walsh for you have revealed much about how we keep ourselves ‘disconnected’ by choosing not to feel what there is to be felt in all our forms of communicating. It struck me how often that I use my senses to react to the social environment I am presented with rather than feel the truth of what is truly being offered as an opportunity to further evolve back to soul.
Once I am not 100% present, thoughts start to sneak in, that lessen me further. In a split second I am object of what outer forces want me to be and to believe. How endlessly more powerful is my ever present essence! Once I reconnect, the false believes and thoughts fall off like leaves of an autumn’s tree.
After reading this for the second time, I still feel the need to read it a few more times, because it exposes so much. Reading “when my hearing is not filtered by habitual reactions I am able to listen and understand what there is to feel”. I realised how much I do that – filter what I hear. This blog is a wake-up call for me. Thank-you E. Walsh.
Through reading some of these amazing comments I realized I had to reread this blog again as I had actually missed parts of it because I didn’t fully connected to it the first time. Reading it the second time I was able to take it slowly and truly feel the multi levels of each sentence. Now this is revealing, why didn’t I grasp it entirely the first time? Interesting, something for me to ponder here, to be more aware of conscious present? Definitely yes. Thank you for this brilliant blog.
Wow a truly powerful blog. You have raised so many great points and have inspired me to be more aware of how I am with life. I definitely feel I am developing my conscious awareness which I have never really considered before I was introduced to Universal Medicine. I may have been doing it to some degree but now I know how amazing it is to be fully aware and present in my everyday life I can choose to develop my senses on a whole new level. To constantly check in where I am with my thoughts and how is my body feeling with every movement and action. Your blog is an awesome reminder for me, am I truly listening and seeing myself and others?
Great question E. An amazing revelation here for all to truly ponder on is the use of senses out of reaction to the environment, whereas the inner heart never uses senses from reaction alone but from truly being open to the whole of what is there first.
To be listened to is truly a great gift, and many people have not experienced this… and just by, as the blog says, ‘taking that step of connecting to oneself with conscious presence, this gift can be brought to everyone that we meet, and it is totally precious.
Thank you E. what you have presented is very powerful and nailed it of how we have become puppets and not really expressing from our essence as we lack that connection where we can truly listen to the truth that comes from the full awareness of our own bodies.
This blog was very powerful for me, I could feel myself repeatedly checking out and I had to really concentrate to take in each word! I will have to re-read this a few times as it’s hit a very big reaction, which is precisely as you write, not wanting to feel what we already know by truly listening. Very supportive and deeply appreciated blog, thanks E.
I also notice the same in me, having to continually re-focus. What a well written blog if it is written in a way to actually bring peoples attention to where they can then feel it and listen to each word and take it in.
I too want to thank you for sharing that Melinda, I kept checking out as well and had to read some sentences over and over. I was thinking, is it something I just ate? But now I realize this blog has brought such an awareness that it also hit a big reaction in me. Thank you E. for this life changing blog.
E. Walsh I really enjoyed reading this blog. It is great to read about the correlation between what we allow ourselves to feel and listening. I have definitely experienced this and have observed that I interrupt people when I react to what they are saying or do not like the way their words feel. You have given me much to ponder.
WOW! A truly powerful expression. It all comes back to feeling first and hearing and seeing from our whole body.
“I know that I am infinitely more than a mere reflection of my environment; I can now see that I’m not the adopted emotions and behaviours that I have been living with. I can reclaim that space I abandoned when I withdrew from my real expression.” It is like those emotions and behaviours squash us into a smaller, confined version of real ourselves. The richness of our lives, experience and relationships truly opens up when we are truly open. Then (and when) we truly listen.
Your words here so true of the mass consumer market: “because when we feed from this global menu of stimulation, with its predictable reactions and encouraged addictions, habits and belief constructs, our interactions then amount to nothing more than an attempt at avoiding what it is to feel”. I agree, our entire society is arranged for intuitive feelings to be quietened down, and not heard, so that in our (chosen) deafness it becomes easy to be owned and controlled for the mass profit driven and competitive markets. Where we become products of that such society, and so far away from the originating essence we innately are – human beings that feel deeply energy and the truth. As you say “We may be hearing – but are we really listening?” Really listening to our inside self, not the outside.
Such a powerful blog and one that I know that I will come back to, as there as so many layers of wisdom being presented. It has become so obvious to me over the years that the majority of people see what they choose to see and hear what they choose to hear, a coping mechanism that starts to develop at an early age in response to the life around them. For me it is an ongoing process to re-learn to listen in full so I can receive all that is being offered, and to be constantly aware, to feel, when I switch off listening and why.
Thank you, A great insight into listening… Most humans only hear about 8 to 10% of their aural environment, ( and remember that they are only listening with 10% of the brain anyway). Listening itself is a wonderful doorway into conscious presence, and when we really listen to people, who, most of the time, feel that they have never really been listened to, it can often feel for them like they have been given a wonderful gift… Just by really listening.
A great article exposing the fact that if we do not first choose to feel then we will only hear what we want to hear and see what we want to see – or perhaps it is not even what we want to hear and see but what others want us to hear and see.
It is like listening with your whole body instead of just relying on the head to catch and repeat what we think we have to know and say. The head is simply not enough to capture all that is there to listen to, and to perceive; we need our entire body to feel and listen.
There is a lot packed into this blog and I feel I will come back for a re-read later however for now what I am taking with me is “For me, losing trust in feeling the self is the same as abandoning the self – it cannot be reconciled – it must be reclaimed.” and “There is a discovery to be made; without choosing to first feel, there is only the appearance of choice.” I know that when I allow thoughts to start playing out in my head and lose touch with my feeling I have abandoned myself and the only way back is when I realise what has happened I can reconnect to my feeling self by coming back to be with me in my body and to then do the best I can to feel first , keep feeling first.
A truly powerful article a great exposing of truth.
Thank you E.Walsh for providing me with a very strong impulse to stop and feel my body as I was reading your blog. I realise that it is so much more loving and powerful to feel when another is speaking, rather than judging or wanting to offer advice, or taking something personally. Living with this deeper awareness is so much more honouring of ourselves, and less tiring.
I am back again for another re-read. There is so much depth in what you have written but in essence it comes down to the simple fact as you write it here “without choosing to first feel, there is only the appearance of choice”. We are all being fooled BIG TIME!
I hear you E.Walsh (pun intended 🙂 are we really hearing or is it selective listening, when I hear someone speak it comes through my filters of hurts and layers of protection. So I don’t necessarily hear what they are truly saying, but a distorted version of it, with all my past and present hurts and protections.
If I allow myself to feel all of this I can respond to the other person, if not I just react keeping my hurts protected.
Excellent blog. E. Walsh – I found the way you have expressed the differences between ‘listening’ to the collective, group lines of thought versus really listening firstly by feeling to be quite thought provoking. I especially appreciated your comment ‘… a stepping out from the shadows and leaving behind what is not truly part of me.’. It is a great motto to take with me as I go about my day. Thank you!
The power and the truth of communicating via the impulse of the body is what I take away from this writing.
E. Walsh you have here uncovered the many ways we do not see what is really going on. I liked your personal reflection ”my communication was merely used as a method of ensuring that I remained shrouded in that generally accepted feedback loop otherwise known as ‘socialising’” that is telling it like it is. You also mentioned some global issues like “our news seeks more to stir up reactions than it does to inform on actual events or encourage open discourse” I have recently felt this was true but never realized it was the driving motive.
E you have exposed something very true here;
‘I need only feel to know a truth because by first understanding through listening reveals truth – much faster than seeking understanding through the slow process of acquired and therefore dated knowledge.’ Feeling verses acquired knowledge. So simple and powerful. Thank you.
Some great points here, lots to sit with and feel. It feels like what you offer is a deeper way of listening and hearing in the world, not one that simply responds based on previous experience, but actually feels what is there and responds in a true way. A great reminder to sit, feel and truly listen in life.
Thank you E Walsh, as you so aptly say ” For example, our news seeks more to stir up reactions than it does to inform on actual events or encourage open discourse, and the young are fed instruction on style and behaviours that promote and benefit the consumer markets.” Lets start open discussions so as a community we can move forward without any propaganda!
It’s funny that our eyes and ears can’t but see and hear all that is there to sense but our choice to be aware of what is offered goes down to what we want to be aware of and how that measures up against our beliefs and ideals of what we think life should be.
Yes Paul, how we think life should be. And we seem to only communicate from reactions, and the way we have learned to communicate from young, rather than from true expression, and from the truth our bodies are feeling.
A very honest and beautiful blog. I can feel your process to get to this point of awareness. Your blog served to remind me that we do indeed use all of our senses to support us in truly being able to feel and read situations around us, and to do this we need to remain supported in our bodies, confident that we can feel anything that comes before us. Being someone who has suffered from anxiety as a result of not wanting to be in my body – feeling everything, I understand this well. But there is a scent to energy, it has a particular sound and taste also. The eyes receive a picture, but how many of us look deeper? Awesome blog! Thank you for sharing.
I have long been aware that I have not been truly listening all my life, and have attributed my oncoming deafness to that fact. What you say, E.Walsh, makes the utmost sense, for as I read your excellently expressed article, I could feel the difference in my assimilation of it as I made more and more contact with my body, and in so doing my feeling and the listening came together, and there was more space to take it in and understand and feel its power.
Wow, I found reading this blog enormously powerful. This is an expose on where we are at as a society – what is in our way to being in true brotherhood. To listen from your entire being is our true way of being but how many of us are really listening in this way? As you have pointed out, not many. I feel I have only just scratched the surface of the depth we can go to in ourselves to really feel what we are hearing so we can therefore truly be listening.
The part of your blog that stood out the most for me was, “Up until this time I had chosen to trust the outer influence over that Inner Knowing – I allowed a division of the self by separating the feeling from the listening and so avoided truly hearing, and this can never stand because that division requires outer reinforcing by way of identifying with the distracting activities. For me, losing trust in feeling the self is the same as abandoning the self – it cannot be reconciled – it must be reclaimed.” This is our way back. Thank you E.
Wow, this has been such an amazing reminder to really feel and listen. I love what you have shared, i can so relate to feeling and then reacting, so not really listening. A pattern i adopt less so today, but still does happen. When it does, I use as a trigger for me to ask myself questions, what is happening here?, what is really going on? Come back to feeling first and open to listening without reaction.
Thank you, a blog full of inspiration and moments of reflection. Feel first, through this we can discern what is and what isn’t us. This supports being present and feeling the truth of a situation.
I agree that sometimes life can seem very loud with all of its expectations. So loud that it seems to drown out the very clear and simple voice of our bodies, telling us constantly how it feels.
Thank you E. Walsh for expressing so clearly what I have come to realise is true that we really do hear what we want to hear and not what is truly being said. I know my thoughts can get in the way when someone is speaking and I don’t always hear everything that is being said. I love this paragraph because it says so much about how I have lived a large part of my life..
“When I allow myself to feel and hear, it simply opens up a truth – a truth I have at times practiced hard to avoid. For me, there is an immense sense of loss in knowing that I have not connected to or met others in my true expression. Instead I sought to communicate out of and through my habits, beliefs and fears – and not out of what my body and senses were revealing to me.”
I find that the more I express and give credence to what I feel, the more I understand life, the more I see and the more that is revealed to me. It’s a really joyous way of living.
I agree Ryan, it is a great article exposing that if we do not choose to feel then we are given the perception of a choice when all we are being given is a choice between differing flavours but still in the same energy. ie, chocolate or vanilla ice-cream – still the same thing just externally looking and tasting slightly different.
Thank you for this blog E.Walsh. It’s a great reminder that by connecting to ourselves and allowing ourselves to feel we will hear more of what is actually said rather than what we want to hear.
If we listen more clearly to what is being said, then maybe we will learn so much more about ourselves and how we could change the way we see things in life.
Awesome, E. Walsh. All of it! Of all the many inspiring things you’ve written that I could quote, and ditto to all the above, this paragraph felt particularly powerful – “…the process has merely been a stepping out from the shadows and leaving behind what is not truly part of me… I can reclaim that space I abandoned when I withdrew from my real expression.” How long have I attempted to reconcile this feeling of abandonment with my true expression and am only now realising, too, that it can’t work this way. It must be reclaimed to be free of the shadows. Learning to allow in and trust what I feel by choosing to stay with my presence is a priceless and precious process that negates the external influences and truly celebrates the Inner Knowing we can all connect to. Many thanks, indeed.
A really great article, thank you a lot, to realise and ponder on for myself and the way we all live.
I, too, am learning to stop and listen to others and be open to feel all I feel and not to react to everything and I am finding it really does make a difference.
I have recently become aware of the “habitual reactions” I go into around my family. I have discovered that I don’t want to feel the hurt and sadness I feel in them… so I have to disconnect from myself not to feel it and then I go into a ‘mode’ of not being me… trying to fix or make things better… but the best thing I can offer is me just staying with myself!
Just Wow, Thank you for such a strong reminder that reclaiming and choosing to feel is what makes us power-full and unique. In my teens and up until I was 22 I wanted to fit into a style, scene or label to feel unique, only to find and feel like one of the masses. By feeling me first now, I may do things that others are not, I may not conform to the norm of life but to me it brings a feeling of space and an openness to say ‘this is me’.
An amazing article exposing how we, at times plod along and allow our beliefs to carry us rather than stopping and feeling the whole truth of what is there to be heard, seen and felt. Thank you for sharing.
Great article. I found, “there is an immense sense of loss in knowing that I have not connected to or met others in my true expression. Instead I sought to communicate out of and through my habits, beliefs and fears – and not out of what my body and senses were revealing to me.” so true and powerful. It is so easy to interact through the safety-curtin of our habits, beliefs and ideals creating an illusion of the the world which results in judgment and comparison as we try to fit the world into our constricted perception of it rather than seeing it for what is and in its fullness.
Great article. When we look we filter what is in front of us by what we want it to be but when we see we allow ourselves to take in what is there to be seen. It is the same with how we filter what we hear through what we want to hear but if we really listen we will feel all of what is there.
Thank you for this piece of writing. I find this line inspiring – “I need only feel to know a truth because by first understanding through listening reveals truth – much faster than seeking understanding through the slow process of acquired and therefore dated knowledge.” A great reminder for me in not being seduced by what I hear!
Thank you for this E. Walsh. Yes there is a great power in listening deeply – listening to ourselves as well as listening deeply to each other.
Wow! So wonderful to read an article that makes sense in a world that makes no sense.
Amazing – it makes it so clear how we can either use our senses to be present and feel or – have them taken over and used by external factors or our own stories, if not by both at the same time.
Very well expressed Gabriele! I know from my own experience that when I am absorbed with myself, wanting to get my point across, I stop being present and feel and therefore I stop to truly listen. I just hear what suits my agenda and try to cut in to say what I want to say.
What you share is so true Gabriele.
Thank you for sharing. I am finding that the only true way forward is to stay connected to our bodies, and that way we know and feel what is really going on inside and outside of us.
This is the true answer I have been looking for all my life.
That was just amazing – I feel deeply how beautifully this blog exposes the superficiality of life in general and how mine has been for a greater part of it.
This paragraph summed it all up for me – “I have started to really listen and truly hear without the anxiety that I once had of being lesser, or that arrogance of being greater, because that space, time and energy given over to the need for recognition or comparison has been reclaimed – or rather, it is no longer required. I need only feel to know a truth because by first understanding through listening reveals truth – much faster than seeking understanding through the slow process of acquired and therefore dated knowledge.”
This is a great blog and the part you highlighted on your comment Sue is incredible. I have to reread this blog again as I didn’t fully grasp the multi levels of what is being delivered here. Truly amazing blog.
Feeling is really listening. That is such a great title and subject to eleborate on. Thank you E. Walsh.
It is beautiful to come to this clear and truly philosophical exposition on hearing and listening this morning. The topic has been very present with me recently where it was clear that true hearing is impaired if there is no willingness to feel first. There are certain things we can’t hear if we don’t feel. Reading your words that there is “division of the self by separating the feeling from the listening” just hit the spot… and helped me let go any shreds of attachment to the situation that were still left there.
As you have said, we create these protective shells to cope with life but they, at the same time, shut out feeling and truth and render us lost. It is so freeing to be able to see what is going on, and not take anything personally.
The aspect you mention concerning masks – “many of us have instead become cliches – predictable, manageable, exploitable and ordinary” – how I have seen this in myself! So many times in the past I would be in a certain group e.g. the bohemian writers’ scene, and adopt all the fashionable views that go with that milieu. At other times I would be in the classical music scene and adopting that way of thinking and being. The very fact that we call them ‘scenes’ in itself suggests theatre and masks. In the end I didn’t know who I really was – I was looking outside of myself to know who I am, and wanting to be accepted at large, instead of being connected to my natural, essential self and expressing from there. I can feel that unless I do that, there is very little true communication with others – either in expressing or listening.
Thank you for this great piece of writing. I reckon you should collect your blogs as a book of essays. This is the philosophy we need for the New Era.
This is such a power-filled blog. The following words expose so much – “many of us have become puppets to a mass market; communicated to collectively, through a media that advertises instructions on how one should feel, what one should believe in and on what is normal (for the fashionable now). For example, our news seeks more to stir up reactions than it does to inform on actual events or encourage open discourse, and the young are fed instruction on style and behaviours that promote and benefit the consumer markets.” That is not the way to build a caring and connected world!