The Healing Power of Listening

In this episode I explore the transformative power of listening.

In a world filled with noise, opinions, distractions, and constant communication, truly listening has become a rare and precious skill, but it is through listening that genuine connection is created.

When we listen deeply, we set aside our assumptions, judgements, opinions, and the internal dialogue that often prevents us from fully meeting another person. 

In that space, something profound happens, we move beyond simply hearing words and begin to experience presence, understanding, and connection.

This episode explores:

• Why true listening creates deeper relationships
• How our internal narrative prevents us from hearing others
• Listening as a form of meditation
• The connection between presence and understanding
• Listening not only to people, but to life itself
• The practice of intentional dialogue and reflective listening
• How stillness and awareness help us become better listeners

Through personal reflection and practical insight, I explore how listening can become a path to greater peace, connection, and self-awareness.

Because when we truly listen, we are simply present.

And presence is one of the greatest gifts we can offer another human being.

Transcript

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When we listen and we properly properly listen to someone, and we don't interrupt, and we don't make a comment quickly about what they've said, or we don't make a face and uh you know any disregard for what they've said or an immediate kind of retort. When we listen, we allow people to be themselves, which is powerful. Welcome to Pearls of Wisdom. Today I'm going to investigate the art of listening, which is a kind of forgotten art often, I think. And listening is a different thing to hearing because I experience in my work with people a lot that people hear different things from people to what the person speaking has intended to say. So I think often people hear something and they'll be hearing it from their own position, from their own layers of experience and conditioning and all those things. So listening, what's listening? Truly, truly, truly listening isn't hearing, as I said. Well, of course we hear, we do hear what someone said, but actually listening isn't just about hearing somebody's words and interpreting them from our own perspective, kind of waiting to speak. That's often what goes on when people are in dialogue, that they're just waiting for their turn, so they're not actually truly listening to the other, they're just preparing their response. I don't know whether this is something any of you recognise, but you might be just waiting until it's your turn, or you've already got a view because you've heard what they've said, but it's struck something in you, so therefore you're waiting now to speak, and you've got your own formed response, and therefore you're not truly listening. Not really listening, and listening is one of the greatest gifts we can offer another human, it really is. I think it's kind of why people are enjoying conversations with AI, because there is a response I've heard people are having a lot of real experiences that help them when they're asking for AI some questions or they're investigating things, both practically business-wise, but also emotionally, and all sorts of situations they're trying to unravel. People are using AI and finding it useful. But I'm I think that's in part due to the fact they get completely listened to and get you know the experience of somebody mirroring back what they're saying and and kind of getting them. So I think that if we recognize that we need to do that for other people, if any of you have experienced that with AI, then ideally we're going to give that to each other because then there is actually the human connection, there is the absolute presence, the absolute silence, the absolute connection. And you know, really and truly, I think people spend an awful lot of time talking, kind of explaining themselves, explaining things, uh, maybe advising people, coming to give their own view of a situation, often persuading people, or often persuading people to do things, whether that's um professionally, or you want somebody to come and join you on an adventure or come out socially, or all this kind of thing, or agreeing, disagreeing, whereas really do you simply listen? And as I've said it, I kind of use the AI because I have heard that from people, they feel they get listened to and they get understood and they get a reflection. Now, of course, that is actually a machine, and it's very brilliant, and it reflects back, so therefore, it's kind of modelling what we need to do, which is reflect, reflect what we've what we've heard to show we've absolutely listened, because um true connection does come through listening, and so really, really giving that gift because many many people say they want, you know, you're not listening to me, you're not hearing me, you're not understanding me, and really, do we give that gift to another? Do we really listen? So, really, in this um podcast, I'm just asking. I suppose, do you feel that you listen? Do you listen to others? Now, clearly, really, when we when we give something, it tends to start to generate that experience everywhere so that there is a reflection going on, because true connection really does arise through listening, and and that's not agreeing with somebody because often people are feeling that they need to give the response somebody wants, that they need to agree with them, they need to disagree with them, they need to advise them all the things I said. So, therefore, that prevents the listening. And when we listen, and we properly properly listen to someone, and we don't interrupt, and we don't make a comment quickly about what they've said, or we don't make a face and uh you know any disregard for what they've said or an immediate kind of retort. When we listen, we allow people to be themselves, which is powerful because often when people are speaking, they're so aware that they're not going to be listened to fully that they'll say, I often hear people saying, Well, this sounds silly, or I know this sounds horrible, but or this sounds this or this sounds that, because they're not used to being listened to, and they're not used to uh being in a position. I think that's that's why. I mean, obviously, I mentioned AI as a place for people to be listened to, but that's why people seek out a therapist or somebody who is, you know, a coach, a therapist, somebody who is going to allow that space or give that space to be completely the person's space to express and to be yeah, be validated because um connection comes through validating difference, not creating sameness. People often hope that somebody's going to be like them or agree with them or have their same views, their same opinions, but it's really important to know that all of those things block listening. So if we're listening to somebody, we have to suspend all of that. Um those condition conditionings we have, those identity we have with our view, with who we think we are, and what we think is good on a political front, a moral front, a um you know, relational front, what what we think is the way things need to be. When we're listening from those stances, we're not we can't listen because we will be projecting, and so much projection goes on, so much judgment. So when somebody's listening to another person, so often there is an immediate um judgment, there is an immediate immediate projection onto what they're saying of yourself instead of listening to what they're exploring, and there's not much stretching to go into the world of another. Now, I'm not saying that's the case of everybody or every conversation, but I think it's something to really consider and really reflect on in your own in your own dialogues, in your own conversations with your friends, colleagues, children, parents, partners, wives, husbands, all of the you know, the people we interact with, just the people we meet lightly in passing, in shops, on buses, wherever we might bump into people. And um I met a man um in the park yesterday. Well, I ran past him, but as I was I was just coming to a little junction and I'd run for about 15-20 minutes, and the rain started to come down, and actually I was finding it rather lovely because it was a warm day, and I I was rather enjoying the rain, and he went, Oh no, it's raining again. And I said, Um, yeah, I'm I I like it, so um, I like the rain, and he said, I don't like the rain. So I thought, oh, I immediately switched because I hadn't been in his experience. I had just responded, he told me it was rainy again, and I'd said, I like the rain, I'm liking the rain, and then then he said, I don't like the rain, and so I said, Oh, you don't like the rain. So there's an it's important to immediately shift out of our experience because I was in my rain-liking experience, bumped into a not rain-liking experience, so it's much more of a connection to validate that he didn't like the rain. Um, that's a tiny experience, but I still have a memory of you know, connection. Whereas if I'd stayed with my I like the rain, then he wouldn't have been very listened to. Of course, he wasn't particularly listened to me liking the rain, but that that doesn't matter. I recognise that if we're in a kind of dance in the rhythm of conversation and we've got the awareness of meeting another, actually, that that is really what we need to be connected to is to think of what we're putting in the space, what we're doing, how we're connecting, are we listening? Because so often conversation is just a yeah, it's just somebody waiting for their turn. But um really and truly, then it comes through validating difference. So I don't feel that he didn't validate me, by the way. He recognised I like the rain, I recognized he didn't, and I think that that did lead to more connection than if either of us had tried to stay with our own positions or not listen to the other. Um, yeah, because it it is, it's through not trying to create sameness because we all are having a different experience, and it's really fascinating to see what experience people are having, not projecting our own onto them, because I think so often people do unconsciously, and sometimes consciously, but unconsciously want others to feel the same as them and to feel and see the world the same way, to feel like us, to have the same views, the same opinions, because in a way it creates a safety for the identity that you've created. It creates a I'm okay then because this person feels the same as me. We both think the same about this particular situation, therefore, we're jolly good chaps. I remember my um my grandfather said that he used to have a friend and they used to meet and chat, and they'd they'd chat about uh the people they work with, they were both in the army, they'd have a jolly good evening and they'd chat about their friends, and and they used to finish the evening saying, Well, Fred, we're jolly good chaps, aren't we? Because that so it is a kind of irony that people do quite enjoy gossip, but actually, truly listening is a meditation. Truly listening, we quiet our own internal dialogue completely and utterly. We quiet that mind, we quiet all the chatter that's going on, all those judgments, all those assumptions and biases and projections and all the things that seem so much to make us who we are, seem to make us know who we are because of our, you know, the way we see the world, the way we think about the world, the way we yeah, project onto the world. Whereas ultimately, if we go from the other perspective, that everything externally is just a reflection of us, and therefore, you know, it keeps us more still and more interested in that reflection. And you know, often the other way around, people what we what we think is listening is actually us just listening to ourselves when someone else is talking. Whereas ultimately, if we're in the silence and we're in the stillness within us and we're listening, we're getting curious about what's going on and what that is, and there will be some reflection with with us in that, of course, but that's slightly another another theme. But instead, listening is relaxing if we are you know listening properly without our own mind chatting on, because otherwise we can't really hear somebody if our own mind is making loads of noise, and you know, listening can become a meditation. Listening can be you know the the the experience of stillness, and it I think it can heal the world properly, properly, respecting that space between one another, uh validating the difference, really listening. I think things can be healed interaction by interaction, and I think it could ultimately heal the world. Now I I recognize that that isn't necessarily happening very quickly, but each person, if you or I commit to completely listen, completely listen, because you know, really then life can become a meditation. We can be in the stillness, in presence, um, fully, fully in the here and now all the time, which means that uh meditation, life's a meditation on the move. Meditation is happening all the time, it isn't something we do. Meditation isn't something we do, meditation is a surrender of all the identity or the noise or the chatter into the stillness and silence within us. And I remember when I first started working with people because I've always been um on what could loosely be called a spiritual path. I think I've many of you listened to my podcast. I was brought into a or I born myself into a Christian family, so we went to church a lot, and I remember eight being aware of the you know that it was important we cleared any of the darkness from within us, and I saw that as all of the all of the things I mentioned, all of the you know, the energy blocks in the form of of judgment and the form of projection, in the form of um pain, pain within us that we project out. So I was aware of this, but I was also really um I was really curious. I was always reading and interested in um working things out, analysing, analysing, analysing, and I had um yeah, lots of curiosity about the inner journey and the spiritual journey, but I do remember I I went through quite a lot of um difficult stuff, as many do, um, in my teens and twenties. I think that's part of the journey can be we we have things to unravel and and and understand to know ourselves better and to clear away this, some of these um, you know, things within us, the the blocks in our energy field which come through through wounding and pain and um essentially a place where there's a we've cut off love to ourselves and we have to heal that trauma within ourselves, even though it's apparently occurred in the outer realms. That's what's so wonderful about the human journey, is we have the opportunity here to experience ourselves as separate and come back to oneness through our own um our own journey. Anyway, so I um when I was uh circa 30 was when I started, I'd worked in health and fitness since I was 18, and in as a personal trainer, and then it led into being a uh psychotherapist training in systemic psychotherapy. And I was sitting listening to people, and the peace I felt, such a deep sense of peace in every session, because I was completely there, and I recognized that it was such an incredibly good space for me to have this essential meditation of complete listening. Because if we keep in that space and we do it with everybody and always fully listening, then life really itself does become a meditation, and of course, it's not it's not just about listening to people, it's about listening to everything, listening to thunderstorms. Yesterday I was working with a client and we had this thunderstorm raging around us, it was wonderful. I think she'll be listening to this podcast, and we had this, you know, clashing, crashing, and the sound of the rain. So yeah, the sound of coffee machines I love, I like coffee shops, the sound of the birds, the sound of the rain, as we said yesterday. The rain in the city sounds different to the rain in um in the countryside or a rushing river, the the waves crashing. Um life is always, always speaking. And are we, you know, are we present enough to ful fully, fully, fully hear it? Because when we do truly listen, something really, really magical happens. We can't we stop having a query during the conversation, you know, is this person is what they're saying correct or incorrect or right, wrong, good, bad. Do I agree? What should I say next? What are they going to think of me if I say this? Um, but instead, if we're listening, fully, fully listening, there is only presence, and in that presence, there's spaciousness, absolute spaciousness, and that creates connection because that is the real we're always connected, so it we can experience that. And of course, one of the ways of doing that is to formally. I teach um couples and people to communicate with intentional dialogue, and sometimes it's good to have it as a formal practice where you slow everything down and you will have a conversation, and it's good to practice this because then it becomes a natural way of being, like anything, and you just um you know say what you want to say, and the other person listens to you, and to show they've listened, they will just let you know what they've heard, and it's always important to use the same words, and also again get out of the way of any thoughts, no internal dialogue going on. So you would just properly, properly listen, check you've heard, and then validate it by making saying it makes sense, getting into the world of the other, saying you know, crossing the bridge into the world of the other person, so that you go, yeah, I get that, that makes sense, given you've just said that. Uh, I can see why you would feel this, say that, and also really then empathize, and that's not empathizing from your own story. People often go, oh, yeah, yeah, that's exactly like me, and I understand because this happened, that happened. So it's not just from your experience, although that can be valid. Our own experiences can be a valid part of sharing, but we'll only know that when we're really listening to somebody and know that actually sharing some similar experience or something can show that you've heard and it can be very powerful. So it's not about not sharing, but it's you know, so even though I'm saying it don't do it from your story or experience, actually, when you listen properly listen, there may be connections that you just check. Oh, yeah, I had that happen. Does that seem the thing? And then that shows that there's the connection that does. So you really show then and demonstrate you are entering your world because systemic psychotherapy is very much about recognizing that we. Are you know part of the system when you enter into somebody else's life and you're in their dialogue with them, you're having a useful conversation with them? That's essentially what therapy is. It's in the end got to be useful, and there are interventions, and there are times when you will give ideas, of course, and actually using your own experiences or experiences you've heard of others, obviously, without breaking confidentiality, it can be very, very useful because people recognise that their experience is valid because it's been validated, but the experience of others are something that helps them. But that has to that comes through really, really careful listening and knowing when to say those things because you then are properly entering their world and you're understanding it from how they've communicated with it with you, and that requires such presence. One of the easiest ways to strengthen listening is, of course, to strengthen presence, and as always, I'll always say, do practice conscious breaths. I mean, it really makes a difference if you can put an alarm on every hour where you'll stop whatever you're doing and take three conscious breaths deep into the tummy, breathe out, the bottom of the breath, experience that spaciousness, that stillness, just three every hour. And if you do this day after day, day after day, week after week, something magical can really happen. I've encouraged many clients to do this, and the ones that do it, many don't. And um and but if you do do it every hour and you do it week after week after week, something happens because then you you come to presence as more of a natural way of being, and it it becomes stillness and the spaciousness inside you because every breath is an opportunity to return, and the quieter you become internally, the better you listen externally to the people around you because every single person wants to feel heard, understood, accepted, it's just part of the human journey, and of course, the more we understand and accept ourselves, and that's our own inner work, we're more in a position not to be carrying our own, you know, our own layers of of opinions, judgments, and everything when we go into listening, but also when we properly listen, we offer all three. We hear people, we understand them, we accept them. Because listening, you know, isn't really just something you're doing, it is a state of being, and it's letting go of your identity, really, your identity, your opinions, your judgments, your need to respond. Now, all of these things, of course, of course, it's fun having opinions, it's fun, and it's fun observing people, but there's a fine line between observation and judgment, but it's it's not about not having ideas and ways we see things in the world, but it's about not being identified with them. And when we let go of that, when we let go of all those things and we just listen and we're just present and we're just there, then what remains is awareness, is presence, and that presence, our presence, is the absolute greatest gift we can give another human being.