Listening in Times of Uncertainty
Times of uncertainty invite us to lean in and listen more deeply.
It's true.
Times of uncertainty for us creatures of habit can be disconcerting.
Right when we have befriended Contentment and enjoyed the gifts of spaciousness and ease, comes the bittersweet duo of challenge and expansion. Suddenly, Life throws new ingredients into the mix, and the traditional recipe for good (or good enough for us) living requires an imminent update based on newfound needs, preferences, and yearnings we might not even be aware of.
Faced with prodding questions and crippling fear, we throw helpless tantrums, insistently pressing the rewind button on the chapter that is inevitably ending and, at the same time, briskly unfolding into wobbly unchartered territory where we must trust. Amidst the destruction and fall, the remote control replaying instances of a seemingly more stable past offers us relief, nostalgia, and control. The plans we had previously created as a provisional road map of the future failed to come to fruition and the path we had been loyal to now appears inaccessible to us.
Think about it this way. The puzzle pieces we had carefully assembled do fit together (don't get me wrong) yet the whole picture somehow haunts us with an unshakeable feeling that something is missing - though we can't quite pinpoint what that might be yet. Caught up in the rapture, we begin to wonder what may happen if we risked rearranging the puzzle pieces differently, perhaps combining instincts and wisdom rather than caution this time.
Because I believe that it’s when we become a bit more unapologetic - taking one one-degree turn at a time, bravely stirring the boat in the direction of integrity (in Martha Beck’s words) - that the soul brings about redirection-inviting changes. It begins whispering to us the next best steps, having inevitably heard our cry for greater freedom. And it does so softly, patiently, and as many times as we may need to muster up the courage to take aligned action.
To hear the whispers, however, we must tune in and listen.
Listening - as I now know it - is more than merely tending our ear to something or someone. It is a means through which we may connect in a way that is intentional, transformative, and meaningful.
Someone who listens - by no means a professional counselor - may well be someone who consciously turns their whole being, including their physical senses, with warmth-infused attention and absence of judgment, to an object or subject of interest to which they form a connection in the present and from which they walk away being changed.
Committing to the listening path means committing to the transformative process of self-undoing and self-becoming. We allow different experiences to impact us - the way pebbles lying across the shore allow the incessant ocean waves to levigate them - while also not attaching to them. And by virtue of this, we are transformed into more of who we already are.
In the courageous and embodied act of listening, we make the conscious choice to drop our awareness from our heads into our bodies, engaging the senses and remembering our hearts. Listening, then, becomes a synonym for sensing and feeling rather than doing. It implies that, instead of attempting to make sense of what is at the forefront of awareness, we feel into it and relate to it through our felt sense of it.
“Ah, yes. Here it is. The gentle, sometimes subtle, and hardly perceptible breath”, we might think.
Listening is a moment-to-moment practice of receiving not just physical sounds, but also thoughts, emotions, sensations, impressions, and surroundings, allowing them to ebb and flow according to a rhythm and tempo beyond effortful attempts at pushing them away or pulling them towards us.
As we practice listening, we might wake up in the morning and dare to ask, “If I were free (to do what I want and be who I am), what would I do today? How would I be?”, allowing the answer to arise in its own time from the depths of our being. Simply becoming aware of what freedom might mean to us that day (or that moment) may set out a rippling echo moving particles, people, situations, and all the other components needed for a seamless transition into the new.
A ‘commuter’s mind’ (aka, the constricting mindset that keeps us from imagining a day different from the one we’ve just woken up from, as Elizabeth Gilbert calls it) does not serve us in a listening practice, though it can be acknowledged and let go of with gratitude.
When we listen, we must acknowledge our fears and gently move through them, reminding ourselves that, although preconceived notions, beliefs, and expectations may be shattered, new ones will be formed. We step through the door of our confined and stuffy rooms, floating outside into the fields of What More Could Be. Not as experts but as learners and beginners at heart, wander, curiosity, and awe fuel our connection to the child within.
Amidst this letting-go process of sifting and sorting through the old, our soul’s whispers are rare speckles of gold - resonating nudges that bring fresh air. We salute pleasant and unpleasant surprises, as we learn we can handle both.
"What are you most drawn to?", "What do you just know to be true that makes no sense?", "What do you yearn for most passionately?"
When becoming more adept at the art of listening, expectations (though natural) are yet another barrier preventing us from embracing the ever-ravelling Present. Striving towards a certain outcome may prove futile, especially if we base our action plan on what has worked in the past.
As you face uncertainty, take your time to rewrite your story; take your time to listen to what wants to happen next; take your time to hear the nudges and glimpses into what's possible - they are your soul's attempt to communicate the coordinates of your new life!
Don't rush though. It’s a process.
By focusing on your moment-by-moment experience, you never know what might happen next, and isn’t that terrifying and great? Anything might happen. There is nothing to lose and you are free. At the same time, you hang on a thin string, and it's scary.
But (hear me out), what if there is a net, a silver-lined one, that promised you'd be okay in the end?
Sometimes, the bravest thing we can do is refrain from tying things up in a neat bow and embrace not knowing. It’s not for the faint-hearted but is rewarding nevertheless, as we find that our inner resources are never-ending and that the healing and energising power of presence alone can give us new life.
May you be well,
Asia