The Art Of Listening With Our Heart

The Art Of Listening With Our Heart

By Bart Sharp

Sometimes relationship teaches us lessons that we would never imagine, it is the beauty of it.  To receive the gifts that relationship may offer generally requires us to listen beyond our ears.  To listen with our heart may be one of our best tools to perceive what is occurring with the one we are relating to.

I was once in relationship with a woman who was quick to become angry and would often verbally confront me for a variety of reasons. It was often for the smallest things. Although I cared for this person it was painful relating in such an aggressive way. Of course I would not have attracted such a person in my life if I did not wish to confront this.

When my girlfriend would become angry my immediate reaction was to defend myself. My mind would start to beginning trying to find reasons why it wasn’t my fault. I would go into my head and a process of insulation would occur while I planned my response. My body seemed to lock up and what arguments that I could present were never that powerful.  It became a force vs force situation.

A friend suggested that I try to let down my defenses when someone attacks. Ultimately no one can really hurt you with aggressions. If we look at our selves from the perspective within our soul is someone who is truly expanded in an infinite great way no one can really harm that within. Yes they may physically hurt your body or bruise your ego but the spirit within can never be damaged. All of us have this kind of greatness deep within us as our core being.

The next time that my girlfriend became angry I was fortunate enough to remember what my friend said. I stopped my calculating mind from reacting. I paid attention to what my body habitually was doing around aggressive people. I perceived energy like a wall that was around me that was building up in reacting to her.

I simply asked my body to let the wall down.  Immediately the defensive energy dissipated. Next I sat and listened to my girlfriend express her anger. My mind was not plotting my rebuttle but focused on her. I listened but what I heard was beyond my own personal references. What I heard was her feelings beyond the story she was expressing. I was hearing her pain, her fears and insights of how they came to be.

I was actually listening with my heart and not my head.

When I finally spoke it from a different perspective. I said, “It sounds like you are in a lot of pain with this?” 

She felt heard and suddenly a potential argument was transformed to us being on the same side.  It was a huge lesson for me. It showed me how my own defensive posturing shut so much out of my life. I could be aware of and receive so much more.

There are three aspects in listening with your heart:

It begins as a cognitive recognition that you wish to let down your defenses. In addition, to tell your body to let down your defenses in each stressful situation.

Secondly pay attention to the sensations in your body. When your defenses go up you may feel the focus go straight up into your head and/or your body tense in some way. When we let our defenses down the focus goes out of our head into a more relaxed whole body awareness. We are more open in perceiving our environment.

Thirdly feel the energy around, outside your body. When I ask my body to let down my defenses I perceive the space surrounding my body get lighter.

As an experiment.  Think of an experience or situation that is stressful. Pay attention of the sensations that occur inside of you and surrounding you. This gives you an ideal of where you tense, how your mind feels when defensive and see if you can be aware of the sensations outside of your body. This gives you an ideal of what you experience in real stressful situations. Of course it is probably more intense in the present moment of the conflict. Then simply ask your defenses to come down, relax your mind and allow the body to follow. Practicing can be very helpful if you have difficulty feeling your body processing.

When we fall into those conflicts when our defenses go up those situations most likely has occurred many times before. We have trained our body to go into fight or flight. It takes real presence in your self to begin to break the habit. Reliving old conflicts or requesting your body to do it differently may be a good way to begin reorienting our selves.

I like to live my life in the non-defensive perspective. It is supporting the reality that I am truly infinite and nothing can truly hurt me so I do not need to defensive systems to protect me. The thing about defensiveness is that it is an automatic system that turns on to begin a chain reaction of events that narrows us into a thinking and attacking mentality. It diverts us from being aware of what is really going on in a situation. We stop listening with our heart and begin thinking in a defensive reaction.

A good practice is to let down our defenses where ever we go. You will enjoy the relaxed posture instead of the stress that most others function in. The more that we stay non-defensive we find that we receive more.  Obviously so because the defensive barriers that we create also do not let other energies inside of us.  When we are defensive we block our selves from all.  Everything on the planet emanates some kind of energy so we are not receiving all of what we can have. We are disconnecting ourselves from the world around us by being defensive. When we do open ourselves we see our generous the world really is which opens us to the same state of being.

When we are in a non-defensive frame of awareness we are opened to receive.  We see situations and life in a different way.  It seems like less bothers us. Opportunities may arise that were not there before because we are energetically pulling them to us instead of blocking them out with a defensive attitude.  Staying opened and staying opening in our heart can change our life.