Listening is Just Another Word for Consciousness

I think most people would acknowledge the importance of choosing who we or our family associates with. When we hang out with cynical or lazy people we can be influenced in one way, as opposed to, if we spend our time with people who are focused on higher values and are appreciative, we would certainly be influenced in other ways. We know this to be especially true with children who are particularly impressionable to the influences around them. As adults, we are not victims to our surroundings, but it’s foolish to ignore the affects other people’s habits have on us.

The reason I am reminding us of how we are affected by others, is to actually emphasis the influence we can have on others.

I’m reading a book on consciousness and the author was making the point that the majority of people living just several hundred years ago were not able to take a conscious perspective regarding their own thinking. He cites different writings from before as recently as the 1600’s to show the lack of introspection and the propensity to assume magical or mystical causes for certain internal impulses. I have been taking the faculty of conscious awareness for granted and would never have guessed that in the scheme of time it is such a recently developed capacity for the majority of people.

Consciousness is obviously a good thing. It gives us perspective of our own internal process and therefore the ability to make choices. It gives us freedom. After all, we are the thinkers of our thoughts. It can be argued that the world’s problems are a function of a lack of consciousness. Conscious people have a greater perspective on the developmental levels of themselves and others. They are able to distinguish and access; compassion and therefore are more inclined to feed the hungry, responsibility causing them blame others less and initiate fewer wars, and values that respect the ecology we all share for our survival.

Consciousness is a practice. Practicing meditation, mindfulness, prayer or learning, are all ways to develop muscles of awareness.

If consciousness is a positive value, how can we influence others in that direction?

I was in a group last night and we were talking about the facility of being conscious of our own patterns of thinking. We were also distinguishing and practicing different forms of listening. When we simply and deeply listen to another we are offering our attention to their internal reality. Literally, thousands of times I’ve witnessed the phenomena that by truly listening to another, they begin to offer their own attention to their own internal reality. They become more conscious. If we listen with patience, presence and compassion they begin to hear themselves from that same perspective.

Listening promotes consciousness, because I think listening is just another word for consciousness.

If the evolution of consciousness is the faculty that will set us free, then perhaps listening is the vehicle that transports that faculty from one to another.

Our most central prayer is not;

Be powerful Israel, be kind Israel, be good…

We are told to listen.

Have a great Shabbos,

Simcha