Listening for oneself, and speaking for others

[obyvatel]

The excerpt I've shared above was taken from a passage which dealt with silence in esoteric development. Clearly, listening for oneself, and speaking for others, is rooted in an internal silence. Meaning, one is internally silent and perfectly comfortable with silence, and does not give in to a need to say something.

Agree about the effort towards not giving in mechanically to the need to say something. The concept of internal silence is questionable based on cognitive neuroscience experiments. When we process speech or language, experimental data shows we carry out what are called "incremental simulations". This means as each word is spoken or read, it triggers processes inside the listener/reader evoking associative sensory images. These simulations run continuously with results being updated or refined as one hears/reads. So internally there is a lot going on when listening or reading - only it happens too fast for our conscious awareness.

 

[hesperides]

quote from Obyvatel

I have experienced this change in tone in different situations. It is usually accompanied by a shallow breathing/holding of breath and tightness in the face and chest area. I may not realize this at all in the moment or if I do, I may put the responsibility on the other person as in "he confused/disturbed me". I can analyze in retrospect what happened. However in the moment, becoming aware of the breath and tightness provide the only consistent clues as to what is really going on.

If I´m speaking and start to hold my breath, usually the other person will register it and unwittingly mirror back my actual intent, not what I´m saying. I can note it by being attentive to his face and bodily expression which will tend to reflect my own state.

Years ago there were certain situations which made me wonder why people would get so serious and overly correct with me and suddenly I realized that this was what my defense system was projecting to them through my body and face expression. When this happens today, I use it as an alarm clock and just start to relax and smile as soon as I get aware of it and by doing this, most of the time people do too because I don´t force them to draw on their own defenses anymore. This in turn will help me to get more in touch with my awareness again.

It´s just crazy how fast this wetiko works in one way or another and this reminds me of what the C´s once said ´'You must never fall down the slippery slope of giving the other the wrong feedback'.

 

[mabar]

I have experienced this change in tone in different situations. It is usually accompanied by a shallow breathing/holding of breath and tightness in the face and chest area. I may not realize this at all in the moment or if I do, I may put the responsibility on the other person as in "he confused/disturbed me". I can analyze in retrospect what happened. However in the moment, becoming aware of the breath and tightness provide the only consistent clues as to what is really going on.

That is certainly something that It had not cross my mind to observe, the "shallow breathing/holding of breath and tightness in the face and chest area", days back I was thinking in that, and it came out the I do not like my voice since I remember, I had heard myself -taped and such, and it creeps me out? I will remind me to observe that. Thanks.

The excerpt I've shared above was taken from a passage which dealt with silence in esoteric development. Clearly, listening for oneself, and speaking for others, is rooted in an internal silence. Meaning, one is internally silent and perfectly comfortable with silence, and does not give in to a need to say something. Then, what is being said (or not) entirely depends on the receptivity of other people which are present. And this comes back to external considering, knowing other people, and being good at reading clues and cues.

Being able to be internally silent is already a good progress I believe, since by default speaking is fully automatic. Few people can plan or chart their words before they come out. Rather it is like a verbal, self-sustaining fountain that pours its content uncontrollably. Sometimes, after a conversation, when you review what happened, you can notice that your words came from somewhere, only not from yourself.

A hint is easyness I believe: When you discover holding a monologue longer than a certain time, which comes easy for you, and you're passively enjoying what comes out, I think it's a sure sign that a correction is needed. Gurdjieff et. al. indicated that wiseacring and carelessly held conversations leak a lot of fine energies that better should be preserved.

But then, there also could be too much silence. If everybody would take silence to seriously (like in a cloister), there would be little exchange. Connecting to others, networking and feedback are important elements of the Work too, and they are based on speech. Even 'smalltalk' is good at times. So again, nothing is black and white, and walking the fine grey border is the art that is to be learned.

Still happends to me that I go from white to black, because it happends that I pretty much be mute, when I am emotionally in conflict , in those cases I assume is when I need to pour out what is happening, but I "prefer" to be mute, with soaring silence, it last for "moments", then the predator and the mother of predator attack viciously, it originated on thursday at work, but I did EE and it dissipates a little bit, --now that I obsserved it, yesterday someone said something related and it hurt, didn't want to answer back, I thought I manage to contain it, but an automatic response brought the genie inside, need to stop it short since I was at work, did some breaths, work activities and swinging back predator's attack, help to dissipate my inner conflict. In this particular case, didn't want to answer back to whom said something that affect me that much. It would had made things worse, though.

 

[patty2292]

So he's saying that conversations should be done like this: listening for oneself in order to learn, and speaking for others

And not like this: speaking for yourself, and only listen to others because it is expected and polite

I think this is a useful reminder for all of us.

Very useful indeed Data. Since beginning In Search of the Miraculous, i have been able to notice this alot more within my work environment. Within others, and also within myself. It seems that when another is 'listening with intent to reply', it drags me into a loop with them where we then both are literally conversing with no ears, but mouths that just want to be heard. Ive found that this is normally due to the fact we are talking about nothing of much interest to me, so it leaves me with nothing to 'learn' so to say. Thus i do feel that i am expected or forced to be polite

But this little reminder has made it clear that these are the very times for inward and outward observation and external consideration :).

 

[lilyalic]

Many thanks for the reminder!

It's definitely more difficult to speak for others within a work environment, as you tend not to be interested in what colleagues are conversing about. I'm guessing the "listening for oneself in order to learn, and speaking for others" idea is external consideration for these others, and listening in a way that doesn't stimulate you to throw your ideas out there. ISOTM explains that we need to know when to be silent, and practicing NOT expressing your ideas is something we need to master, this is to trail more away from our mechanical aspects and more towards an inner, peaceful silence.

 

[eleusis]

So he's saying that conversations should be done like this: listening for oneself in order to learn, and speaking for others

And not like this: speaking for yourself, and only listen to others because it is expected and polite

Thank you for this thread Data. It is a timely reminder and caused me to review a conversation I had today with a neighbor from down the hall. I rode with her on the train and we were speaking about her student loans. Student loans and the usurious interest rates can raise my temperature and put me in a soapbox frame of mind.

When I look at my thinking though, and because of EE, I can feel a huge gap where I had an opportunity to learn and I didn't. To really listen to her and find out what her experience is and to grow from there. I was centered in a lower emotional frame of mind being mildly outraged by the student loan scam. Again, because of EE, I could see and feel the points where I was nervous because we don't know each other that well and we were on the train together for thirty minutes and my need to entertain, my need to fill in moments of silence and my need to let her know I was on her side in the whole matter. Of course, I didn't listen long enough to exactly know what her side was or is cause I couldn't shut my yap long enough to find out. Also, reflecting on the conversation I can feel an overall sense of not having listened or even having that be my purpose.

A thread like this helps me to refocus and review and realize the extent of my nerves and how it makes me run off at the mouth as well as my mechanical need to instruct because I know something. Yikes. Where's the thimble where I can put all that I know in it. :P

EE also helps me to feel my own dismay at what could have been an excellent opportunity to get to know myself and someone else a bit better and to really connect and it helps me to feel out where I caused the breaks in the flow and what my emotions can teach me about the truth of what happened without having to dip my soul into a dark pool of self pity. I can definitely do better and now that I've read this thread and written about it I'll be more alert and conscious. Thanks everyone for making this thread live.