mindfulness (3)

At Christchurch, Clarendon Park Road this evening for the third session in the course on "Mindfulness" offered by Christians Aware. Leading the session is Ian Grayling (backed up by his colleague, Kevin Commons) from the city's Serene Reflection Meditation Group. Our topic this time is "Listening". We begin with a guided meditation, helping us recognise the difference between being tense and being relaxed. We finish up with quiet listening and consider if the room is really silent when no one is speaking. It's not, of course, but it's interesting how many different sounds people can hear, either outside (the clock on the wall ticking, flourescent lights humming, traffic in the distance) or inside (their own heartbeat, the rush of blood in the ears, the effects of tinnitus).

From week one, we've been becoming familiar with the Mandarin Chinese symbol for the verb, "to listen". It includes the symbol not only for the ears (which we'd expect for listening) but also for the eyes, for undivided attention, for the heart and for the whole person. Listening requires more than just hearing. Tonight we practise some of the skills needed for using the ears and eyes in giving undivided attention - including dialogue, paraphrasing, open questions, empathy. These aren't anything new or startling of course, but the brief experience of practice in small groups tonight is instructive and worthwhile. Listening demonstrates respect; empathy demonstrates compassion; giving the speaker your undivided attention draws the heart into the process. We come to the conclusion that listening and getting it wrong is better than not listening and still getting it wrong!

It's a four mile round trip to Christchurch from my place, on foot. I enjoy the walk (even on a freezing cold evening like this one) and enjoy listening to Ian Dury on the way there. But after having done this session on listening, I find that I walk all the way back without benefit of iPod - not intentionally, but that's unsual for me to do three quarters of an hour in silence. I guess whatever we were doing had some kind of effect ...