Sacred Space
Listening Well Is The Most Eloquent Sign Of
Caring
Most people report that they are hardly ever really listened to
very deeply or for very long. Partners in Healing (clients) who
come to my counselling practice often tell me that nobody has
ever listened to them their whole life. Listening well is an art
form. When we are young, there is very little emphasis put on
learning how to physically, emotionally and spiritually listen.
There are very few human models of listening well from which
young people can learn. Listening is not just limited to hearing
with our ears. Emotional listening is when we are “tuning in”
to the energies and the frequencies of the other person. Some
scientists believe that we can only really “hone in” on another
when our pineal gland in the middle of our brain is in harmonic
resonance with the pineal gland of the other person.
Sacred Space is born when two people or more are in
sympathetic attunement with each other. Sacred Space can also
be created by forming a spiritual cocoon around a person when
one is imbedded in their environment. The projections of “inside”
and “outside” melt away leaving the individual in a state of
ecstasy. Sacred Space can be created, sustained, nurtured and,
unfortunately, sometimes pierced. Sacred Space requires that
a “safe container” be established wherein the people involved
feel secure and protected from spurious interventions. Ground
rules need to be followed to ensure this.
One of the most well-known techniques for learning how to listen
well is the ALT, or Active Listening Technique. ALT is based on
the idea that we must not separate the sender from the receiver.
In this “inter-subjective” technique there is no division. There
are two subjects fusing as one entity. In most successful
listening methods it is generally recognized that the
kinesiologists are probably correct when they hypothesize that
7% of human communication is through the actual words we use,
38% is through the way in which we express those words, and
55% is non-verbal, subtle and operates at the subliminal level.
This summer I went to a retreat seminar at Esalen Institute
at Big Sur, California, called “Cortical Field Re-Education”. I
also went to a retreat seminar at Assisi Institute, Assisi, Italy,
called “Wrestling with Angels”. Both of these wonderful learning
experiences were focused on how to train one’s Psyche to listen
to the “total message” of what is going on in and around oneself.
At Esalen we practised visualizations for entering our body’s
cortical field and changing and/or updating any out-moded
dysfunctional default systems with new and life-affirming
defaults and non-reactive operating systems. When our cortical
field is aligned with our authentic Self, we are then able
to “listen well”. Our director becomes our own Psyche, not
someone else.
At Assisi we focused on discerning perturbations in our energy
field and re-aligning our Psyche to be in harmony with our
dreams, our highest aspirations and the Archetypes of the Soul.
In Assisi we studied the emotional and spiritual lives of Saint
Francis of Assisi, Saint Clare of Assisi and Hildegard von
Bingen. All three of these highly religious individuals attained
an extremely high level of Spiritual Enlightenment. All three
seem to have moved well beyond any institutionalized, dogmatic
religious precepts and to have ascended into the realms of
angelic energy. They all had learned how to “listen well”. They
had spiritually evolved into Sacred Space while alive!
I have had many discussions with Catholic friends, Jesuit
scholars and Catholic priests in which I have challenged the
concept that the Virgin Mary was indeed a virgin. In the Assisi
seminars I received my first reasonable answer to this apparent
conundrum. Mary had “virgin ears” and could listen to the voices
of Angels and could thereby spiritually conceive a “Golden Child”.