Most of us consider listening a great virtue. We love having others listen to us with interest and care, and we hope to be good listeners ourselves. But for most of us, listening is hard. To listen well, we must become aware of the mental...
by Kimberly Brown
(follow me on Twitter)
"People with opinions just go around bothering each other." (Attributed to The Buddha)These days, it seems like everyone has an opinion, everyone is expected to share their opinion, and everyone must...
Listen.
That drill outside the window,
They're fixing the street so it won't collapse under us.
On the subway, a baby howls.
Pull out your earbuds,
Breathe in her high-pitched wails.
The heart of the world is bleeding, and she can't shut the valves...
While the fruition of meditation is not something to be measured, it can be helpful to look back and see how far you've come.
Learning to meditate is like becoming the skipper of a sailboat. The boat represents your life. The hull is like your...
I was listening to an episode of Being with Krista Tippet recently, and Krista was interviewing Dr. Scott Atran, author of Talking to the Enemy. Dr. Atran made one assertion during his interview that really struck me:
How often do you really listen without filtering?
Unmitigated, unprocessed listening — no labeling, no judgments, no interpreting — is something very rare.
Most of the time you're probably judging, criticizing and filtering...
