Inner listening

"It is this inner listening and this watching that enables you

to see things other people cannot see,

hear things that other people cannot hear and

know things that other people cannot know."

Directives

"Observe yourself. See what your mind tells you. Listen to the different voices within you."

"To understand your deeper premonitions and the urgings of your heart, you must begin to listen. Listen within yourself. Listen to the world without judgment and condemnation. Listen for the signs of what is coming. Listen to how you must respond. Listen to who to be with and who not to be with."

"There are very important qualities that a listener must develop, qualities that have tremendous benefit in all aspects of life. You must become used to silence. You must become very courageous, which means you are willing to see things and hear things that have direct bearing on your life. You must learn to be very patient. You must learn to trust your own experience to a high degree. You must learn to be discerning, for much of what you hear will be quite useless. You must be determined to penetrate your own thoughts. You must be persistent, have great regard for yourself and treat yourself graciously."

Listening within and listening without

”Whenever you are with someone in conversation, it is very important to still your mind so you can hear what they are really communicating, and so you can also listen to what you are communicating, to see if it is what you really need to be saying and doing at the moment. You are listening in and listening out at the same time. Are you really saying something that is meaningful? Are you really expressing what you want to express? Do you need to say anything at all?”

Inner listening practice

"I use many of the small open spaces in my day to practice Inner Listening. Over time, this has become habitual, Practice does make permanent."

"As you become receptive, you will hear many voices. Not all of them will speak truly. Become a good listener."

"When you are communicating with someone and you realize that you are not really communicating and it is uncomfortable for you, that is the time to start listening to the other person. It is the time to stop talking and start listening.When you are ill at ease in any situation, it is a time to stop talking and start listening. Here you must listen without judgment because you want to hear what is there. You want to be able to feel how you feel while you are hearing what is there. You want to listen inside and outside all at once.Then you will know if you should be in that situation or not."

"Here you step back from the mind. It is not who you are. You step back from your thoughts. They are not your deeper thoughts. You step back from the images, and the imaginings, the thoughts, the feelings, the fantasies, everything. Let them pass by you and you watch them objectively. If you are practicing stillness meditation, such as in Steps to Knowledge, and you cannot still your mind, it is destined to practice this observation. Watching your thoughts pass like a parade. Letting the mind do whatever it wants to do, and listening deeply within yourself. We're bringing the same practice here to your inner world, to the stream of consciousness. This is particularly important at times when you are aroused, either positively or negatively, to step back and watch this and practice inner listening.”

"Regarding the issue of listening: many of you prepare to listen but give up too soon. The Teachers do not need preparation, but you need to find a way to hear, and this receptivity must be developed. It is retraining the mind to be in relationship."

"In the study of Steps to Knowledge, you learn how to listen within yourself. Instead of just trying to have immediate insights or ideas, you learn how to simply listen. In the practice of stillness, you are listening.

"This listening, this paying attention, is so important. You develop this skill within your practice in taking the steps to Knowledge because these steps will teach you how to listen within yourself. They will teach you how to become patient and observant. They will help you to settle down and become less restless. They will relieve you of your anxiety, which drives you constantly in life. They will enable you to experience your deeper feelings and emotions and to forgive those individuals and those circumstances that you feel have wounded you in the past. Now you are learning to listen, and you are listening for the deeper current of your life. Now you are listening to others."

What to listen for

"I want to go back to God because, whether people believe in God, it is important that they know that there is a part of them that cannot be corrupted and has never been corrupted. And, that there is a way that that part of them can speak to them and advise them. And this is, you could call it your ground of being, your gut feeling, whatever you might call it within a religious or a general vernacular, there is a part of us that has to advise us."

"Because Knowledge is not chattering away all the time, like your personal mind, you will find that you will listen and there will be nothing. But that is what you want. You want to listen and experience stillness and experience openness and emptiness to open your mind. Knowledge is not some little answering machine that just gives you answers any time you want them. If that is your experience, then you are not yet engaged with Knowledge. You begin to value the stillness, the quiet, the peace, the reprieve that this experience will give to you."

Listening for and following Knowledge

"Knowledge will indicate what you need to do, but you still need to look and listen and learn. This is what allows Knowledge to guide you. Knowledge wants to make you aware. It wants to make you wise. And it wants to make you a person of ability. Therefore, do not passively wait for Knowledge to tell you what to do. Participate in life and Knowledge will show you how to do things. This is because Knowledge is here to elevate you and to increase your possibility for success in the world.

To follow Knowledge, you must adhere to what you deeply experience, and you must value your experience beyond your preferences or the preferences of other."

Metaphors for the practice of inner listening

"Like exercising a muscle in the body, you are exercising the faculty of mind called listening."

See Also

Practices

Seeing

Stillness

Questions to ask

Talk:Inner listening

Further Study

• Wisdom from the Greater Community Volume One, Chapter 20: Inner Listening

• Deepening Your Spiritual Practice (November 1, 2008)