Last night my best friend called me at 1am. I was still awake but in bed and JUST about to turn out the lights. I contemplated not answering as I knew it would re-energize me and I had had a super long day, but I had a missed call from her earlier before, so I picked up.
After some small chit-chat, she began to tell me about an incident with her boss that day. As she went into SPECIFIC detail about the story I just (literally) sat back in listened. She legit spoke for about five straight minutes without me uttering a word.
I had attended a Buddhist lecture earlier in the evening. I think my exhaustion coupled with the very Zen feeling I had post-lecture put me some sort of meditative state where I was able to be present and hear her without the need to interrupt or interject.
When she finally paused and asked “What do you think?” I was able to offer my advice in a clear and thoughtful way. Rather than the usual “Yeah, your boss sucks,” I brought up the possibility that her boss actually had a point, it was just delivered poorly. I then suggested that the poor woman was tired, having just returned from maternity leave, and undoubtedly that effected her mood.
What was super interesting was that my friend in turn was actually listening to me.
Now we are both chatty Cathy’s, my friend and I. So a conversation between us is usually like two squawking chickens both vying to get a word in. But last night was different.
Inevitably we decided her was boss was in fact just plain tired and probably conflicted about leaving her new baby, so my friend was to go to work early and help make her bosses life easier. We both felt good about this resolution, and I think something actually changed in our relationship.
We HEARD each other.
In this crazy busy self-absorbed life we lead, listening falls by the wayside. The other day I spoke with my sister on the phone, and after talking for a long while she said, “You know, you just talked about yourself for 20 minutes. You haven’t once asked about me.”
Blasted, I hadn’t.
I have another friend whom I love, but who can NOT have a conversation while simultaneously checking her phone. It’s infuriating, its rude, and it kinda says “I don’t care what you have to say. Its not important to me.”
The great yogi Krishnamurti says that love is ATTENTION.
And the best way to practice that attention and cultivate listening is on the mat. When we begin with meditation, we let everything fall away and we focus on the breath. As we stay with our breath through our vinyasa, we can hear what our body is saying. In Warrior One, your back knee might tell you its feeling too much pressure because your hips aren’t open. In Ardha Chandrasana your collapsed chest may tell you to grab a block for this one, tough guy.
Cultivating this art of listening will help you profoundly in ways big and small, from improving relationships with your family to deciding to leave a job or a lover, to putting down that gorgeous cashmere sweater at Barneys, because even though its on sale, you have 20 just like it at home.
Listening brings us to the moment at hand, it takes us out of our own heads (and egos) and makes us present to what is there in front of us. And what is there in front of us is life, and its whispering to us everything we need to know, we just have to hear it. Its saying: “I love you, I love you, I love you.”
