Listen Truly

Author: Mubeena Mohd

  • The Business Case for Listening at Work

    The Business Case for Listening at Work

    Are you a business leader who wants to build a great company culture?

    Listening is a key skill that can change the dynamics of any workplace. Training your staff on listening has the potential of significant time and cost savings while reducing effort and building trust. Don’t miss these benefits to your business.

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    As a professional listener by night, not many people know what I do during the day. My day job as a management consultant to government and multinational organizations spans over twenty years of experience advising leaders and HR Managers on building exceptional workplaces.

    Sounds like a mouthful, but essentially, what I do by day is exactly what I do after office hours. Every day, I teach organizations how to listen. To their employees, customers, community, and their instincts.

    Listening is not conventionally listed as a professional skill. This needs to change. Most productivity and efficiency problems can be traced back to the lack of listening during communication. 

    It’s not easy but it’s a critical part of business success and long-term profitability. Why isn’t it easy? Don’t you just have to shut up and watch the other person speak? And what has active listening got to do with being profitable?

    It’s hard because concentration is difficult. And even more so when so much is vying for our attention through technology, mental health issues, and whatever else is going on behind the scenes of our lives. But the benefits to the business world are measurable when leaders become discerning and effective listeners. And great businesses use it for sustained success.

    The good news? Listening can be taught. It is essential to build any kind of relationship, be it business or personal. Think about how many negotiations you’ve been a part of. How successful have you been in influencing others to your logic or point of view? If your success has come without active listening, you’ve been playing a great game of chance. Good luck with that.

    In my blog post What Your Brain Does When You Think You’re Listening, I cover why it is so difficult to concentrate when trying to listen to someone. Before you read on, if you haven’t read my previous blog post, I suggest for you to do so at some point to really understand the way our brains process while listening and how you can improve this life-changing skill personally.

    The Business Case for Listening at Work - people sitting and discussing in the workplace

    When people fail to listen adequately in the workplace, even in seemingly straightforward transactions, it can lead to errors that are completely avoidable, people’s feelings being unintentionally disrespected and the next big idea buried without a trace.

    Here are my top 3 results that effective listening creates for businesses of all kinds. I have observed these benefits first-hand with leaders across the world over my twenty-year consulting career. If you’re interested in the psychology, check out, what your brain does when you think you’re listening.

    Be Sustainable. Plus, Save Time and Effort.

    With all the rage about sustainability in business, effective listening saves organizations millions of dollars’ worth of time and space. How? They use less paper and reduce the effort it usually takes to process and act on information.

    Most leaders I talk to insist that their employees must write down emails to officially record communication even after verbal conversations. Putting everything into writing, even the minutest of details, is no doubt a surefire way of planning and achieving goals.

    However, paper trails are notorious for causing red tape when many organizations are leaning towards flatter and agile structures.

    Writing and reading are much slower processes than active listening and can cut into valuable time for a business.

    Build Trust in the Workplace.

    With lesser need for written documentation, there is an added benefit in cognitive terms. In oral communication, humans tend to use all of their senses and thus, more can be communicated in a single message when compared to the written form, which relies on the visual sense alone. Also, there’s nothing like the give and take nature when two or more people communicate face to face.

    Practicing listening the right way creates trust in workplace culture like no other act does.

    Listening also builds trust because it will allow for upward communication more often. In my experience with organizations, downward messages are cascaded at will from top management.

    However, not many leaders create avenues for messages to move up from what is happening on the ground. Even if messages do get to the top, they are never in their original form.

    Increase Your Sales Revenue. 

    You got that right. Over my twenty-year consulting career, the most dramatic shift I’ve noticed is in sales techniques across varied industries.

    Aggressive selling is not the norm anymore as customers are tired of endless telemarketing and false advertising. Low pressure forms of salesmanship have been gaining momentum over the last decade, in response to customers wanting to feel safe and cared for with products and services.

    Customers want somebody to listen to their concerns and this is where the best sales professionals have excelled.

    Even if customers do not buy at this time, they won’t forget an empathetic salesperson and the brand is elevated until they are ready to buy in future. And if a professional who is a great listener moves to a new company, there’s no telling where customers will go and who they’ll follow.

    If workplaces can institute effective listening practices, think of what changes could occur for businesses. How much time and cost would be saved? What kind of effort can be cut down? What will trust look like? How would leaders appraise the performance of their best talent and retain them?

    Small effects build over time. Great workplaces are built with a strong culture of trust at their core, which shields against the rampant epidemic of a disengaged workforce. If not for any other reason, think about the bonding real listening creates in every interaction between a business and its customers.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. It’s Teachable

    Listening is not easy, but it can be taught with the right principles and formal training. Employees with greater listening skills perform higher and build better relationships.

    02. Increases Profit

    Effective listening can translate into higher profitability and sales revenues. Customers today want to be heard by companies, rather than be subject to aggressive sales tactics.

    03. Builds Trust

    The best leaders have a distinct goal of building high-trust workplaces and they recognize listening at work as a key competency where upward communication is enabled.

    final thought

    To find people who listen truly in their workplaces is rare. Most leaders do not give this competency much credence in a formal sense, despite a lot of lip service. This is partly because listening is indeed a difficult skill to master on a consistent basis. It requires concentration and tuning out of hundreds of other items vying for attention. In my two-decade long consulting practice, the number one advice I met out to leaders is to tune up their listening skills. Most think they do it correctly and in adequate frequency. But when they truly understand its business benefits, they wake up to it. If you are an employee with a lofty career goal, take heed of this skill and develop it. Because it will help you stand out. Your leadership and the people you care about will consider you indispensable and your contribution will surpass expectation.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • What Your Brain Does When You Think You’re Listening

    What Your Brain Does When You Think You’re Listening

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Chances are, you’re not listening correctly. We were never taught the art of listening at school. What does it mean to listen truly? In this article, I bust the myths surrounding our assumptions about what good listening is and explain what our brains actually do when we think we’re listening. And here’s what to do to improve this self-defining skill.

    Most people don’t know how to listen. Don’t believe me? Then do my test. Get a group of people at random to listen to a short lecture. How many people in the group remembered the talk? You will find that the average person wouldn’t recall half the talk, even if they seem to be in the act of listening.

    Now, you might blame the speaker for being boring and not engaging enough. Or you may blame the results of this experiment on the poor memory of the group. But let me push back and insist that your group did not proactively listen.

    The truth is that our cultural upbringing has not taught us the art of listening very well. Remember how you were told as a child, “Pay attention!” “Be quiet and listen!” “Don’t daydream!” These expressions have been nothing but punitive.

    As adults, we’ve developed negative assumptions about listening, such as high intelligence and reading levels are required for this ability. Our school systems place high importance on reading and have not focused on the oral part of communication. Listening has thus been left to degenerate.

    There is a valid reason for why concentrating on listening is tough. It’s because we think much faster than we speak. The average speech rate in the western English-speaking world is 125 words per minute. That is ultra-slow motion for the human brain to process. We’re asking our brain to compute words at an extremely slow pace, which makes it frustrating for us to concentrate.

    Our brains have no choice but to process other thoughts that come its way while listening. In other words, when we are listening, we tend to have spare time in our brains. The key to great listening is how effectively we use this extra headspace.

    Blog 13 image 2

    Here is how to effectively use the extra space in your mind as you process what someone is saying:

    Think Ahead of the Talker

    When words are spoken, think about your own conclusions about them. This might sound counterintuitive to what listening is, but when you engage and interact with the words of the speaker in your mind, you are using the extra headspace you have while processing the words coming at you. You are not making final conclusions or premature judgements. All you’re doing is concluding what the speaker is saying for that moment. Don’t be afraid to amend your conclusions the more the speaker talks.

    When you practice mindful self-interaction while the speaker talks, you are training your brain to avoid distractions and lengthening your attention span.

    Analyze the Evidence

    Think about the supporting points your speaker is offering to confirm what they’re saying. If the speaker isn’t offering much evidence for their argument, know in your mind that the argument is incomplete. The key is not to say it out loud until the person is finished making their point and has paused. Practicing the use of logic, analyzing an argument’s premises, and having strong criteria of what makes a point valid will increase your ability to listen effectively. You aren’t just passively hearing what someone is saying. You are summing up their stance within the safety of the extra space in your head.

    Listen Between the Lines

    When a speaker is talking, look for hidden meanings in between their spoken words. This is not about putting words in their mouth. It’s about paying close attention to nonverbal communication, including body language, facial expressions, gestures, voice pitch and tone. Ninety percent of communication is offered through nonverbal means. As a listener, what people say between the lines through gestures can give you an added advantage to understand a speaker’s motivation and offers you the opportunity to ask whether the speaker is being genuine in their speech or has deeper meanings to offer than what is presented on the surface. Read them like you would a mystery novel.

    Synthesize Ideas, Not Facts  

    You’ve probably thought that good listening amounts to being able to regurgitate facts provided by a speaker. On the contrary, understanding ideas is what makes a good listener. Facts are laid out only as a support to the bigger idea. The tendency to focus on facts is illustrated in many students who take copious notes during school lectures or employees who are in training sessions. Instead of writing down big ideas that a collection of facts leads to, most write down word for word what a teacher says in the classroom. Most people do not synthesize the information they receive. Paint the bigger picture by listening.

    Regulate Emotional Filters 

    There is one instance where listening becomes easy and a breeze. It is when the speaker talks about our own views and resonates with what we believe in, and thus we emotionally connect with the speaker. When we hear something that is against our worldview, our brain becomes overstimulated, and we end up tuning out. Either way, our powers of critique are put to rest by the emotions we feel. So, my suggestion is to wait before you make a final evaluation. Exercise patience by withholding judgment if you find yourself reacting emotionally. But here’s the ultimate thing to do – look for evidence that goes against your deeply held views. It will make you objective in your dealings and build empathy for others, despite opposing philosophies.

    The next time you are in a seminar, lecture or one-to-one conversation, apply the mental exercises above. Before the communication takes place, prepare yourself to use that extra headspace you know is coming while the speaker talks. Your brain wants not only to help you absorb and retain information. It is egging you on to become a well-rounded person by objectively evaluating the information, the person in front of you and assimilating the big ideas that could change your world.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. Brains are Fast

    We speak at a much slower rate than what the brain processes. That is why we find it difficult to concentrate while listening to someone. Your brain will look for other distractions to fill time gaps.

    02. Extra Head Space

    When we process what someone is saying, an extra space is created inside our brains. The key to listening truly is how we effectively use this additional headspace to assimilate ideas.

    03. Mental Exercise

    Withhold judgement, seek evidence and study nonverbal communication to assess your speaker’s stance. You can develop listening skills to an extent that will change you deeply. 

    final thought

     

    Interacting with the self is the essence of true listening. Don’t succumb to conditioned assumptions that good listeners are more intelligent or that they have good memories. The important activity is to train your brain to talk to itself during lag in time between what the speaker is saying and your brain processing that information. Make use of that lag by interacting with your own thoughts about what the speaker is saying. Look for the bigger idea, the patterns, the things they’re not saying directly, and what you believe about it. The most courageous thing a listener can do is to seek evidence that goes against their point of view. Do not let pre-set emotions cloud your listening experience. True listening will expand your mind, increase empathy and allow you to step into being more than what you think you are.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • An Alternative Mental Health Model Inspired by Carl Jung

    An Alternative Mental Health Model Inspired by Carl Jung

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Mental health is a global epidemic. What we have is simply not enough to address the crisis. But, what if we turn the traditional model on its head and look at mental angst as an opportunity? The model I use at Listen Truly takes inspiration from the work of Carl Jung, who saw mental health challenges as a calling from the soul to renew itself.

    With a broken health system in most parts of the world, mental health faces the same fate. Economic reasons notwithstanding, access to mental health care and rising costs erect further barriers for people to receive the mindset support they need. But what about the mainstream mental health model that’s been the bedrock of the psychiatry and psychotherapy industries? I believe the fundamental model of mental health is the most significant conversation that needs to occur for mental health success to be realized.

    My perspective on an alternative mental health model is the paradigm I use in my professional listening services and largely based on the work of Swiss psychotherapist Carl Jung.

    Here are the core tenets of my alternate mental health model based on Jungian psychology.

    You are not one mind. You are part of a collective.

    In traditional models, the mind is an indicator that you are a separate entity from the rest of the world. Nothing can be further from my experience. I have brought people back from the brink by helping them realize that they are not separate from a collective human experience. Human trauma is our collective history and it reveals itself through individualized mental and life events.

    Whatever is showing up in individual circumstances is a mere reflection of what Carl Jung called the collective unconscious. This perspective relieves the pressure of identifying a so-called problem as unique or originating from a mind that is not working right. Whatever you go through is a human experience that someone has been through before and we’re all part of a collective intelligence that evolves from individual circumstances.

    Mental health is a Collective Responsibility

    The illusion of separation melts away when one looks at a paradigm of responsibility that includes us all. Traditional mental health models fail by isolating people who are facing trouble in life and in their minds.

    The act of isolation leads to prominent stigmas that have prevented people from seeking help and support. Ever heard of the saying “it takes a village to raise a child?” Let’s not forget it takes us all to support full grown adults through their mental health journeys.

    We have to revisit the narrative and language around mental health issues from individual problems to a humanity-based paradigm. Practically, what does this mean? Mental health awareness has come a long way, but we still send people off to get fixed and let them know that they are not valuable unless they fall in line.

    More people need to be trained philosophically on existentialism, epistemology, and spiritual systems of the world, not just medically. We need to see human beings for more than their productivity value and keep pushing for answers on the question of “what does being human mean?”

    Blog 12 Carl Jung

    There is purpose to neurosis. 

    This is probably my most controversial stance. As a spiritualist who views the mind as part of a giant collective that evolves to higher states of consciousness, I believe that what we term neurosis has a function. When faced with a mental health challenge, it is essentially a call to adapt one’s self.

    Carl Jung viewed mental health issues as an opportunity for the soul to unpack and put itself together for renewal and growth.

    Traditional mental health models criticize this principle because it is believed that mental health issues are abnormal and a sign of defect that needs correction and elimination. The traditional model thus succumbs itself into what Jung would describe as a societal archetype of the perfectly functional person (when no such thing is possible nor is it desirable).

    In my practice, clients are led to find meaning in every experience by exploring what cultural and social norms affect their feelings about the situation. Carl Jung called these socio-cultural norms archetypes and human beings regularly draw from them unconsciously.

    Treatment is About Helping a Client Find Meaning in Experience.

    This is the core idea of my practice in professional listening. Carl Jung believed that what most people need is a compassionate, empathic listener whose motivation is to contribute to the fabric of what he called Unus Mundus. A unifying force behind one world.

    There is no separate you and me. We are representations of differing vantage points and each experience occurs to teach and build awareness. A therapist or listener engages with a client in a way that accepts every experience as valid truth, not a problem to be discarded.

    Jung focused on unmasking what he called the persona, a public image of the self that is portrayed to conform to societal expectations thereby leaving behind the authentic self (think about how social media images and profiles are presented). He thought that mental angst can result from over-identifying with one or many personas at the cost of the path to realizing one’s full potential.

    When clients come to the realization that they are not just a parent, spouse, employee or any other role they might play, they often will uncover a deeper purpose and not be affected by circumstances that occur day in and day out. In my practice, when it is warranted I ask them (with their permission) over a few weeks to contemplate who they are if a certain title were to be taken away. 

    Coming to terms with this truth is a healing experience and empowers the client to separate from ego. Their issue is then viewed from who they are and how it is pushing them to become who they want to be, a concept Jung called Individuation. Thus, the act of becoming is a central tenet in helping clients address their mental health. 

    In effect, the listener-client relationship here at Listen Truly is defined by one goal. To forge identity and to discover self-worth through the act of existing and the process of becoming.

    The Role of a Jungian Therapist is to Share in the Client’s Truth.

    As a Jungian psychologist, I believe that the only way forward with a client is to create a space to work out what it all means. They come up with their own answers from past experiences, desires for the future and a shift in perspective about their situation.

    Carl Jung offered his psychology for the whole of life, not for pinpointing disorders or illnesses. This is another departure from the traditional model, which for decades has focused on targeting problems that may show up chronically even after treatment.

    The treatment, for lack of a better word, meted out by a professional listener like myself is to work with the client to formulate an archetypical framework they can refer to throughout life and assign meaning to each experience.

    Even though this approach might not apply to mood or thought disorders, Jung would insist that medicating people with psychotropics dims the ability of people to question and ponder their human experience.

    Jung famously said “a mystic swims in the same waters the psychotic person drowns in.”

    This article obviously touches the surface of Carl Jung’s work that has gained resurgence of late and has seeped into my professional listening practice.

    Mainstream psychology has considered the work of Carl Jung delusionary, but the question I ask is how are we really doing? We are on the path to a mental illness epidemic more than ever and conventional models are failing in the midst of this crisis of our species.

    The time is overdue for the need to bridge mysticism, esoteric studies, mythical stories that form our collective human experience to what we experience individually. My humble mission is to be of service towards this endeavor.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. we are collective

    Carl Jung coined the term collective unconscious to refer to every trauma, desire and experience throughout human history. We are thus never alone.

    02. purpose in neurosis

    When faced with a mental health crisis, Jung believed it is a call to the soul. An invitation to unpack and renew the self for the act of becoming who you really are.

    03. finding meaning

    Treating mental health challenges involves unmasking personas and assigning meaning to experiences by drawing parallels with Jung’s socio-cultural archetypes.

    final thought

     The work of Carl Jung has regained prominence in academic circles because science and spirituality are finally building bridges towards each other. As mental health crises are reaching epidemic proportions, there is resurgent openness to exploring Jung’s psychology where the soul’s journey is the center of treatment modalities. Instead of viewing life events and mental states as problems to be eliminated, the alternative mental health model at Listen Truly employs a perspective of purpose in these challenges. The goal of a Jungian therapist and a professional listener is to help the client understand that they are part of a collective intelligence that has been passed down through the ages. An individual’s mental experience, life event, trauma or desire is a timeless reflection of this collective consciousness. Once a client comes to this realization, they are empowered to find meaning as solidarity and hope arise as cures.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • Roots of The Loneliness Epidemic

    Roots of The Loneliness Epidemic

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Loneliness is now considered to be as dangerous as smoking or substance abuse. Millions suffer from it in silence. Our ancestors shielded their survival by grouping up into tribes, but we are more isolated today than ever before. How do we beat this global epidemic?

    It isn’t a medical illness, and yet, it affects as much as 1 out of every 3 people on earth at some point in their lives. There is no formal diagnosis for it, and yet, people die from it every single day. No test has been invented to discover it, and yet, humans have complained about it since the dawn of civilization. I’m talking about the raging global epidemic called loneliness. Some studies point to its devastating effects by comparing it to smoking and substance abuse. It predicts early death and increases the risk of suicidal ideation. And it just feels awful when you don’t like your own company all the time.

    I’m here to shed light on this contemporary phenomenon after listening to dozens who’ve experienced it. But first, what is it exactly? And why does it cause so much anxiety? When needs for social connectedness are not met, the sense of self can take a beating. To be part of a group has been the basis for our evolutionary survival. Without a herd, early humans died from extreme cold, starvation and predatorial forces that they couldn’t fight alone. The benefits of staying together are the foundation of what we call community today.

    Why do we find ourselves lonely?

    Once people explicitly did not need a tribe to survive on their own, progress has since forced human beings to come to terms with the idea of not being needed. The ancestral brain is thus still coping with the aftereffects of humanity organizing itself into civilized society. It does this by pushing back with a primal reaction to loneliness.

    Let’s look at the most common responses when I ask, “Why do you describe yourself as lonely?” I don’t fit in. Nobody sees the real me. I am exhausted after [insert traumatic event]. My job does not let me have a social life. At my age, I should be [insert financial or marital status]. 

    I notice that these surface-level responses correspond to a common root – the unconscious wish to be invisible. Out of fear. This results in self-isolation that can translate into crippling loneliness. What is this fear, you ask? It always comes down to being rejected. By a social group, community, society, country, world, any other kind of collective you can name. And the root cause of this fear of rejection? How about being appraised, assessed, prodded, and judged only to be declared “you’re not good enough for us”. In the cave days, humans literally died from this out-casting.

    Blog 11 image 2

    Is it just the elderly?

    No. Many moms reach out to me. New moms are expected to have a glow and embrace the experience of motherhood, which can be a special time especially when it’s been a lifelong goal. However, sometimes, they end up feeling lonely when dedicating each waking hour to their child and being socially isolated due to fatigue and an ingrained guilt that all mothers face at some point.

    Then there are young people who have moved to a new city leaving their family and friends behind for a lucrative job opportunity. Career success at times can turn into loneliness very quickly when corporate demands chip away at a person’s time they set for their interests, relationships, social life and rest.

    Senior citizens, especially when they’ve lost long-term partners, face abject loneliness all over the world. The hole left behind by loss of a long-term soul mate never seems to get filled and many in the elder community haven’t the energy to find a new purpose to live for.

    We want so bad to belong and yet we don’t take bold steps to ensure this because the fear of rejection is greater than the joyful camaraderie. Because it can be taken away from us. So we stay put in isolation and numb ourselves against feeling anything. As dire as this epidemic sounds, there is hope if we can muster up the courage to acknowledge its hold on us. The first step is always the hardest. To admit that we are lonely. What then?

    Slow Down and Make Meaningful Connections.

    Many of us avoid making meaningful connections. We choose to climb to the top of corporations, get busy being a parent or spouse, or hop from one place to another to chase a lifestyle. What we believe “success” is appears to conflict with the idea of slowing down and connecting with others to build truly meaningful relationships that have our backs.

    No wonder people feel lonely standing in a room full of unfamiliar others. After all, getting out of a secure zone can lead to judgment and rejection. Ask yourself, “who truly cares about what happens to me?” Slow down and build those connections. Make them mean more than an activity that fills up your schedule.

    Find Purpose.

    So how do you create that meaning? Most of us wake up and get into routine without a greater purpose. It does not have to entail saving the world. A purpose can be personal, for example, a monk’s purpose is to attain nirvana through the meditative practice. Or it may involve creating a service to improve quality of life for a community or bringing people together by entertaining them with your talent. Dig deep and find it. And if you have trouble, offer compassion. Volunteer towards a cause and feel the value of your contribution. You are always needed. Once you know that you are worthy just for existing, loneliness cannot define you.

    Be Alone. This is not the same as being lonely.

    We’re bored if there aren’t people to chat with. But with purpose, doing anything by yourself can be rewarding and satisfying. Curling up with a book to gain specialist knowledge you can apply, practicing mindfulness and being in the present, and getting creative through writing or painting extends your sense of self. Treat your body well, eat high-energy foods, exercise, and enjoy plenty of sun and nature. The best relationships come to fruition when you know your identity goes beyond things like a job title or a beauty standard. It tells the world that you’re the kind who looks for meaning in everyone and everything, whether by yourself or with others. Meaning is where the worth is.

    Isn’t it ironic that we live in an increasingly connected world with all this technology, but are feeling lonelier than ever? And with the arrival of artificial intelligence, we’re stripping away the basics of who is saying what, let alone working out what they truly mean. Swiping like we do on dating apps has become the norm of how we are treated, even in the offline world. Loneliness is on course to win at this rate.

    Now more than ever, is the time to dive deeper into our visceral need to connect. There’s a reason our evolutionary ancestors wired this into our brains and it will once again keep us alive for centuries ahead. 

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. Admit It

    The hardest step is admitting that we are lonely. Acknowledging that we want authentic connections, beyond the number of likes and friend requests on social media, is the stigma to break in our age of loneliness.

    02. ‘Alone’ is Not ‘Lonely’

    There are many people who are single, living by themselves and who are very well-adjusted to life because of loving who they are. When you have purpose, loneliness cannot find a way to define you.

    03. Look for Meaning

    You can be lonely in a room full of people. To beat this epidemic, look for meaning in every interaction. Build quality relationships that have your back and offer the same. You can’t be rejected for the value you bring. 

    final thought

    The loneliness epidemic is a threat to our collective consciousness. When we were cave people, getting into a group protected one and all from predators, extreme weather and extinction. Today, we’re facing a deep paradox about what it means to be human and the adage that we are social animals is questionable. With increasing isolation, trends like ghosting where communication isn’t considered necessary and us living longer, loneliness is a silent killer. We need to return to our primal urge of connecting for a clear purpose, build tribes that enable us to thrive, and not use technology to distance ourselves. Surviving separately is not viable.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • What It Takes To Be A Professional Listener

    What It Takes To Be A Professional Listener

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    I’m here to address a question from scores of mail I receive every month. What it takes to be a professional listener is probably not what you think. I do not hire other listeners because what I offer is my specific uniqueness. If you are considering this work, read on. 

    Every month, I receive tons of email requesting me to train others to be professional listeners. I love that people want to help heal, and that there is a real interest in alternative therapies to get clarity and relief for the mind and heart.

    But there are also certain caveats to be aware of. And to be honest, this work is not something you can train others on. It has more to do with who you are rather than what you do as a Listener.

    Since I am not able to answer every email, I thought I would publish a blog article about the profession and demystify some commonly held beliefs. If you are interested in being a Listener, sit back and digest what it takes to be one.

    Here is what I think you should consider before setting out to do Listening work.

    It’s Not Easy

    Although many people reach out to me, there is a sense that most people think this is easy work. If you are listening authentically, this work can be rewarding but also psychologically draining. If you think you’ll just have to sit back and ‘hear people out’ about their ‘problems’ then you are not practicing authentic listening. With this work, you will find yourself drained and emotionally affected by the stories you encounter. In Listening, you do not separate your own emotional vulnerabilities like normal therapists must do. It will not be easy – dealing with awkward silences, angry individuals who have a right to outbursts, or those who profusely cry over things we consider trivial.

    You Can’t Judge

    The craft of being empathetic does not come naturally because it involves purging any kind of judgement, opinion, belief and view of others. If you find yourself judging and forming opinions on the spot about others, gossiping, and finding faults or criticizing strangers and those known to you, you simply do not qualify as a Listener. In my book, you would also be disqualified if you are quick to correct someone or tell others what they ought to do, think or feel. This is where it gets very hard to stay authentic. Your view of people in general will be challenged and tested with every client and it is imperative that all the views you’ve held in the past about people be buried.

    If those weren’t enough to give you a reality check, here’s more:

    Watch Your Energy

    Absorbing tremendous amounts of negative and angry energy requires you to take care of your own vibration field. I find that people who are not spiritually inclined or do not believe in energy are not qualified for this work. As I’ve said before, it is not easy to take in what people spew out. There will be things you will hear that will make your blood boil or cause your hope for a better world to diminish at every turn. This factor alone will scare you away from the profession if you do not manage your energy levels. As a Listener, I do not advocate for talking about your clients or their stories to anyone, unlike therapists who are trained to speak to ‘supervisors’. I also do not approve of maintaining a personal diary as an outlet as it risks getting found. The way you practice will need to work out what outlet in your mind you create for managing your well-being.

    Biases Will Blind You

    If you have preconceived notions about a race, nationality, ethnicity, culture, language, gender, sexual orientation or religion, this work is not for you. Listening is about connecting as a human species. If you currently hold grudges, anger and have yet to forgive people in your own life, I suggest working through it before taking on Listening clients. We all have biases, but you will need to put them aside for the individual across you. This is essential when doing Listening work and is the first principle in witnessing the healing journey of others. You will have to possess the quality of hyper-awareness of your own self, your feelings and learn to self-manage your biases and prejudices of the people, places, cultures you are ignorant about. Allowing biases to creep up will taint your listening process. This work is about who you are, rather than the technique you use. The process, technique, practice and nuances of the craft come alive when you know who want to be.

    Formal Study of Philosophy

    Perhaps the only competency or skill required from the best listeners is that they will have studied not only counseling, therapy, psychology or any of fields related to the Humanities, but also be philosophically trained. By this I mean you will need to be familiar with the major schools of eastern and western thought (ontology, epistemology, etc.) because this applies when clients begin to ask for your perspective. Let me be very clear that in this work, there is no advising. Rather the client comes to their own conclusions, answers, action plans to forge their own path. But as a Listener, you will be asked for your perspective. Notice I didn’t say ‘opinion’. At most, Listeners offer higher-level perspectives which draw from philosophical insight and study of the humanities. You will never offer a personal opinion or an “I think you should do this” response.

    More Than Money

    The last thing I’d like to say about this work is most important. If you are into this work for money, you aren’t offering the real craft. Neither should you practice Listening without getting paid. All I’m saying is that your purpose has to be clear to you. My purpose is spiritual practice related to non-judgment of others. Without defining your purpose and getting specific about the impact you want to create for others, you will be sucked in by the emotional turbulence of this work. Your own life’s issues will be magnified, and you will follow the likes of many therapists who are trained to bury human connections in their professional work. Listeners do the opposite by experiencing what their client is facing without putting a label to any human suffering.

    If you are brave enough to say ‘yes’ to these questions, you are on your way –

    Are you ready to let people deviate from the norms of the world?

    Have you forgiven family, friends, colleagues or others who have caused you pain?

    Can you listen without offering your own opinion?

    Are you able to remain neutral in the face of offensive comments or immoral acts?

    Can you accept other religions and beliefs as ‘truth’ no matter how far they are from yours?

    Do you believe the idea that there is no right and wrong in ethics and no ‘one truth’?

    Have you been a formal student of philosophy?

    Can you keep secrets and maintain the utmost confidentiality?

    Please consider these questions carefully. When you feel ready, start listening to people around you. Do not go convincing them that they need your help. People will open up naturally when they see that you do not judge, condemn or criticize. Do not get caught up in starting a formal practice without first listening to strangers on the bus, the train, on sidewalks or in the elevator. Start practicing right where you are, with a smile, a greeting, a helping hand, or a random act of kindness. Be who you are and the techniques will come through.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. You Sell You

    You are not selling listening services. You are selling yourself as a person and what you can bring to a client’s sense of self. 

    02. Know Your Biases

    You have biases that will affect your listening skills. If you are known to convince others of your viewpoint, stay away from this work. 

    03. Managing Energy

    Listening is not easy and requires you to manage your physical, mental and spiritual energy. If you are drained, stop immediately.

    final thought

    I don’t mean to scare you away from this work. In fact, if you are ready to make a difference to the healing the world needs, start your own practice. I receive many requests asking to “join my team”. But this is a spiritually-based business that I prefer to work in by myself. The way I conduct sessions cannot be replicated and I urge you to find your own style. There are millions of people who want to be heard and not judged but growing my business with more people “under my team” goes against my intention of healing others with my direct help. 

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • Why The World Needs More Than ‘Active’ Listening

    Why The World Needs More Than ‘Active’ Listening

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Let’s explore what the ‘active’ means in active listening. Does it really help change the world, or does it contribute to its dark side? You decide.

    You may have heard the term ‘Active Listening’ before. The term is often used in corporate training settings concerning communication with your target audience, customer, stakeholder or colleague. But my fundamental question is this. Why does the word ‘active’ have to precede ‘listening’?

    According to the definition of Active Listening on BusinessDictionary.com, the act involves mindfulness, comprehension, attentiveness and feedback. On the surface, each of these skills is about sitting back and absorbing another person’s verbal expressions. However, they are duly reserved for that moment only.

    It is ironic that in practical terms, the ‘Active’ part of listening mostly concerns proving that you were indeed listening. And so you must provide feedback by making noises or restating what you have understood. I am all for staying in the moment and comprehending what someone is saying to you. But after that, most people can’t wait to pounce back with a reply. Their opinion, expertise or belief must have its day in the sun.

    I call this the ‘must reply’ syndrome. As a society, we suffer from it daily without thinking twice about how it is shapes our world. We refuse to engage unless someone else pays attention to our narrative in return. This has become our standard of what is fair. 

    I believe the ‘must reply’ syndrome is one of the biggest contributors to the dark side of our world. It is the basis of all violence, all worthlessness, all subjugation, all abuse, all atrocity, all hate, and all suffering.

    As Homo Sapiens, we have survived by killing other beings perceived to be threatening, different or foreign. The fact is, we are not in survival mode anymore and have no reason to use tactics to kill the ‘other’. But we still do so everyday, because we make it our mission to reply to whatever seems to disrupt our way of being, thinking and doing.

    The world can change faster and for the better when humanity stops replying in order to ‘prove our point’ which serves to feed our egos, our pockets, our false sense of security and whatever else is a prehistoric threat to our so-called survival.

    If we work together to get rid of the ‘must reply’ syndrome, we would not need the ‘Active’ part of Listening. And our world would have much less – 

    Less Violence

    I remember being struck with Michael Moore’s documentary ‘Bowling for Columbine’. As a non-American, the idea of gun violence by the hands of children in schools remains alien to me. Although I am not a stranger to physical violence, the film taught me about using listening as a tool to prevent such acts. Marilyn Manson, the death metal artist who was named as a possible cause for the Columbine massacre, was asked what he would have said to the students who chose to kill that day, who regularly listened to his music. His reply was a simple “I wouldn’t say anything. I would just listen.” What he meant was beyond the mere sitting down and letting those troubled young men speak. I believe he meant something deeper by realizing that the tragedy reflected the subconscious or collective troubles of youth everywhere.

    Less Abuse

    And I’m not talking of only the physical kind. Sexual, mental, emotional and verbal abuse is rampant to such an extent that the world has grown immune and numb to its devastating effects. We have come to readily accept that these ills come with the territory of life and this I believe is a form of self-abuse in itself. In my practice as a professional listener, I have heard countless stories of abuse and how people wished someone had listened with the pure intent of believing them, no matter how off-the-wall an incident was, or who their offender was. The key here is to listen without reaction, and with plain pure belief. If you show surprise, disgust, or even pity, you have at once removed the other party from the realm of still having a place in the world. It is a question of fostering a culture of believing so that protection is imminent, natural and deserving.

    Less Hate

    Hate manifests as racism, sexism, and many other isms of late. Hate is a product of ignorance and stereotypical perceptions that are easy to hold on to and last for the long run. Our concept of hating others is a rudimentary form of self-preservation, as if we still live in the wild with predators amongst us. Listening to those who are different not only enriches the human experience but also softens the part of us that wants to hate for an illusory sense of security. Again, when I mean “listen” I mean really getting into someone else’s skin. It is not about having a conversation for the moment and replying with ‘your side’ of it. Hate runs deep and it takes unconditional forgiveness towards yourself and others to undo it. Once we understand that all people hold worth and have something amazing to offer the world, listening to others will be a joyous experience. Find out what that feels like, starting now.

    Less Heartbreak

    Struggling with relationships? We have all been there and you are not alone. Give out love for the sake of it. Love anyway. Compassion is the lifeline of human connection, and forgiveness the bridge. People break our hearts based on what they know at the time, and if we are open to listen to our past lovers’ heart of hearts, it gives our pain meaning. The anger, frustration, hurt and resentment that accompany heartbreak are vehicles to get us to another place of understanding. The growth and renewal from a heartbreak has a value that reveals itself only after you authentically listen to the purpose of the past relationship – a karmic debt, a spiritual lesson, a new standard to be set for yourself, an awareness of your eternal worth. Without this, heartbreak will repeat itself until a time when you are ready to listen.

    Less Deception

    When someone lies to you, understand that it is a form of masking his or her real self. Make a habit of accepting them and their lies. This sounds counterintuitive (like a lot of what I say), but if you can get to a place of letting go of wanting others to be answerable to you, honesty is what you will attract consistently. Nobody is answerable to you. It is their will to share what they feel invited to. When we know of deception from the other person, your best response is ramping up your awareness about their disconnection and accepting it without the intention to change them. People who experience your response will either come clean or will find another to deceive. The beauty of this response is in its non-judgment. When you forego the common label of deception as inherently evil, that’s when you are really listening to another person.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. no ‘active’ listening

    The ‘Active’ in active listening is unnatural and unnecessary. The act of listening is a proactive deed in itself, and ‘active’ implies the need to justify that you were listening by restating the obvious, followed by replying.

    02. the ‘must reply’ syndrome

    We consider replying, answering and explaining to be the fair thing to do. But it is the basis for all the violence, hate, abuse, heartbreak and deception. We react with opinion and oppression too soon.

    03. collective subconscious

    When I speak about listening, it is beyond comprehending someone in the moment. It is about raising awareness within yourself about what it reflects about our society, and what it means for humanity.

    final thought

    Listen with a clear intention, with a will to believe, with the faith that we are all one manifested as different expressions of the same source. Our planet thanks you for going beyond the ‘active’ in listening because true listening is a proactive exercise in itself. I invite you to change the world around you by listening to one person at a time, get to know their story, their reason for being and offer them time and space to expand their mind, heart and soul. We are all connected, so don’t separate yourself by telling them what they are doing wrong, what they ought to be thinking or what they should be feeling.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • How Silence Serves As Your Ultimate Healing Ground

    How Silence Serves As Your Ultimate Healing Ground

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Silence is golden and it shines through when you are ready for heightened awareness. Silence in its very nature is the healing ground that is accessible to anyone. If we get to know what it is and how it serves us, we would use it more often and discover who we really are.

    Silence is golden. You’ve probably heard the saying before and may have read it hanging on the wall of your local library. But it’s hard to find a moment of silence in today’s world. In fact, most people are unfamiliar with the thought of it. The lack of noise is desperately taken as a cue to begin feeling restless, awkward, uncomfortable, bored, anxious or depressed. Silence often means there’s ‘nothing going on’ and most people avoid it. In an elevator you’ll find them either looking up at the lights flickering through each floor or down at their phones. Filling silence is what we do to get by each day. Why is the deafness in silence so intimidating? One of the most frequent questions I get asked about the way I practice listening is “So what happens when I have nothing to say and there’s this awkward silence?” You’d think the answer is pretty straightforward. People expect me to say that I try to fill this awkward silence so that my client could get back to being comfortable again. The real answer is, I encourage my clients to face this silence and embrace it with the depths of their being. Spiritual masters have taught the benefits of silence and stillness for hundreds of years in every tradition. They offer prayers, meditation and healing using silence as the preferred medium of transmission to the divine. I personally find silence to be cleansing and I often use it as a reset button. It is the precise nature of silence that makes it a firm healing ground. Here are some of my personal reflections on the way I perceive silence. I believe these traits of silence make it a natural tool that’s freely accessible at will when you need relief. Being aware of these characteristics right now will help you connect with silence when you choose to channel it.

    Silence Underlies Everything

    The first feature that comes to mind when I think of silence is the most fundamental. We think of silence as a pause before hitting the play button again. But I look at silence as the true nature of what underlies everything we say, do or feel. It is silence that allows words, music and noise to pop out and be heard the way they were intended. Without silence there is no music and without stillness there is no movement. And if there were, we wouldn’t perceive it so. Knowing that silence underlies everything not only builds an everyday appreciation for sound. It provides self-awareness that silence exists, persists and is eternally available to return to. When there’s nothing or nobody around and you need to reach out, make silence your best friend and go inward. It offers a limitless amount of space, time and depth that can be utilized to reclaim your power.

    It’s Thoughtless and Formless

    Spiritualists want to be in company of ultimate reality. If you can imagine a thoughtless, formless, empty, eternal space (or non-space), then you have touched the tip of what silence paves the way to. Silence is the armor the mind can wear in the battle against millions of thoughts that pass through and affect our psyche. Stillness is the medium spiritualists use to cultivate a thoughtless mind. For ordinary folk, actively seeking silence enables us to be thoughtless and experience no limits for a few seconds. Formlessness is the true self and embodies the truth that we are not separate from each other. Silence gives us that inkling.

    Free from Stimuli and Response

    Yes, silence seems to be so very boring. But a restless mind is always looking for what’s next and needs to be artificially stimulated. The body needs movement, air and sensation. The brain needs coffee, pills and food. The mind needs thoughts, beliefs and ideas. Its no secret that these stimuli provide enjoyment and fixes to keep you busy, productive and satiated. Their job is to keep you away from silence, stillness and solitude. I’ve come to realize that silence is free from any stimuli and response. It just is. It requires no stimulus to stay in motion and neither does it respond to noise. This is the definition of ‘dead’ but it is also the definition of higher consciousness. This awareness keeps knee-jerk reactions at bay.

    Eternally Permanent

    When I observe silence, I revere its eternally permanent nature. It endures during life, death and everything in between. Embracing the silence in each moment brings in the realization of the temporary nature of material things, physical life, challenges and achievements. Nothing stays stable for very long. A winning streak does not stay forever and neither does a losing one. Each phase begins only to end and new cycles constantly emerge, be it in sport, business, the stock market or anything that takes form. The universe lived before we took form and our planet will stand strong long after we’re gone. Silence is what is permanent and is the gateway to experiencing never-ending consciousness in the moments we choose. The next time you face a disappointment, a loss, an angry incident choose silence. Then allow it to help you truly know the impermanence of your situation.

    Gateway to Your Identity

    For most urban dwellers identity is a matter of where you were born, what you do for a living, what your passions are, who you’re married to, what you own, or some such notion supplied by the outer world. If you want to know who you truly are, then going inner is paramount whenever you’re ready. This is a tricky concept because I’m speaking of self-awareness beyond the outer layers. You can be aware of yourself on many levels including the physical, mental, personality, habitual, preferences, etc. But the real game starts when you become aware of the fact that you are awareness itself. We are the only species proven capable of thinking about our thoughts and knowing what awareness is. Unfortunately this capability is not acted upon as much and not encouraged as part of our worldly education. To get in touch with your real self, practicing silence is essential. The stillness gives rise to the idea that you are a spiritual being undergoing a human experience.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. Age Old Knowledge

    Spiritual masters have taught silence and stillness for hundreds of years in every tradition as the preferred medium of transmission to the divine.

    02. Natural Armor

    Silence is the armor the mind can wear against millions of thoughts that pass through. Silence brings in the realization of the temporary nature of all things.

    03. Aware of Awareness

    Silence works when you become aware of the fact that you are awareness itself. Stillness let’s you know that you are a spiritual being having a human experience.

    final thought

    The many benefits of silence go beyond cries for getting away from it all. It is a deeply spiritual practice to seek and stay in silence. It is also the healing ground for the soul. It empowers one to stay present and become aware of the impermanence of all human emotion while elevating the knowing that we are connected by a permanent consciousness. Becoming self-aware is a lifelong journey and silence acts as a catalyst. Being in silence enables you to observe what comes up and forces you gently to accept it. It allows you to experience being human in the truest sense, distancing yourself from temporary labels.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • What Causes High Stress for Everyday People

    What Causes High Stress for Everyday People

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Stress is a part of life. This edict is too readily accepted. In this article, I cover the most stress-inducing issues that cut across culture, background, nationality and race. These come up time and again in my Listening sessions with clients and I think it is high time that a new response to stress is forged that does not rely on panic or anxiety.

    In my experience as a Listener I have heard life stories, events, situations, problems, celebrations, regrets, dreams, hopes, fears, you name it. After listening to hundreds since the start of my practice, I have come to learn a lot about what makes everyday people tick. I wanted to write home about it because most people think they’re the only ones facing these all too common stress inducers. Stress comes in all forms. Surprisingly, a lot of folk think that stress is actually good for you. Let me be uber clear on this. Stress isn’t a good thing. Stress is still the number one cause of most illnesses, mental health problems, heart disease and the ability to recover fully from any kind of physical or emotional trauma. If it isn’t good for you, then why does it exist? Let me explain this a little through the lens of human evolution. Back in prehistoric times, we weren’t that different from the animal world. The beasts of our planet use a flight or fright response when confronted by predators who want to have them for lunch. While this response mechanism came about to give our animals the best chance to survive in the wild, its remnants are still present in human beings. Panic, anxiety, depression and fear are all humanly manifested forms of prehistoric stressors. My question is – do we still need to panic and drum up anxiety in order to survive, thrive and live a full life? Physically we’ve moved on, evolutionarily speaking. But stress hasn’t left us even though we’ve become conscious of our free will. Most people have not awoken to the idea that they have choice in every matter, including how they respond to stressors. Most people still give away their power in favor of base reactions ingrained in us from eons ago. Here are some of the top stressors that are most commonly expressed by my clients no matter what their age group, background, culture or values.

    Doing What You Don’t Want To

    Many of my clients feel stress about dreaded tasks and to-do lists. They are either not great at it or feel frustrated at the amount of time they have to spend. Administrative tasks and paperwork are one of the most common elements that come up in Listening sessions. “There is so much to do and not enough time or resources to complete them, plus I hate doing this day in and day out” is what I hear often. Having to do what is unwanted can accumulate into life-long stress if it isn’t eventually managed or outsourced. Every person has a fair amount of stuff they don’t like doing but have to.

    But if the stuff remains the same, it translates into not having grown or developed and that’s a sign of stagnation. The daily bread is often the daily dread.

    Death or Divorce

    Major life events that people all over the world go through everyday cause significant stress. Many people reach out to me simply to process the loss of a loved one. I’m not only talking about physical death. Death is also felt in the form of broken relationships where dreams are shattered and the loss of someone who was always around is experienced. The intense feeling of missing a dear one terribly is what many clients come to me to help them through. Now here’s an interesting observation I’ve made – a separation or divorce is sometimes more traumatic long-term than the natural physical death of someone. I believe it has to do with the ultimate finality of human life that allows people to recover after grieving. With a divorce or separation, clients find it hard to attribute causes related to their own responsibility when their relationships break down. Unless a loved one’s death was mysterious, traumatic, painful or shockingly unexpected, divorces seem to be harder to work through.

    Too Much Clutter

    I’m always surprised by how much people complain about the disorganized mess in their physical space. No matter how many times I tell myself this is a one off or side issue, it seems to come up time and again from clients all over the world. It’s definitely a glaring reflection of inner lives for sure. Hoarding is pretty common, especially for sentimental items. The sheer physical mess does weigh heavy on people though. In the middle of listening sessions, usually after a period of silence, I will hear “Gosh there’s so much stuff in my attic / on my desk / my house / my handbag”. Nevertheless, I’ve come to see that a lot of momentary stress has been relieved when clients resolve to do a thorough cleanup. First of all, the cleanup process is ‘analogue’, i.e. getting away from digital life. Secondly they experience a sense of renewed motivation, and finally they’re able to sleep much better when things of old exit their space. When I ask what it is that would make clients feel better at this moment, the most frequent response is “Cleaning up my [fill in the blank]”.

    Lack of Energy

    The amount of energy you have throughout the day impacts how you feel about life. Many clients tell me that they are not happy about their energy levels. They can’t seem to generate the willpower or strength to do all they want in the day. Related to the first point, having to do what you don’t like can actually deplete your energy and hence reduces your willingness to put in a 100% to the things you love doing. A wise person once said that you have to complete what you don’t like first, then continue on to things you love. I wonder if its not the opposite. Anyway, many clients talk to me about not having the energy they require because of lack of exercise, bad eating habits or work that requires them to sit at a desk all day. I hear a lot about debilitating lower back issues preventing the enjoyment of physical activity. People express to me how they wish they could get outside in nature a lot more but their low stamina stops them from exploring to the heart’s content.

    Complying with Standards

    Finally, the obligation to comply with standards set by society, religion, political parties, friends, family, industry and one’s own self causes huge stress for everyday people. This stressor definitely cuts across classes, social status, income levels, nationalities, cultures and any kind of dividing human factor. Every culture and society has standards of work, beauty, social standing, etc. The majority of people are stressed trying to comply with these for reasons of being accepted, praised and even getting paid is dependent upon this compliance. It takes time and awareness to realize that each person can create their own standards, which leads to innovation and new leadership. When people comply, they do it for safety but also for following the crowd. We make up standards and we will make new ones. The question becomes who is going to break the mould first and choose to forge new standards that nobody else is obliged to follow.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. Stress Ain’t Good

    Surprisingly, a lot of folk think that stress is actually good for you. Let me be uber clear on this. Stress isn’t a good thing. It is still considered a major cause of most illnesses.

    02. Evolutionary

    Panic, anxiety, depression and fear are all humanly manifested forms of prehistoric stressors. Fright or flight responses by animals still remain in human beings.

    03. Standards

    We make up standards. The question becomes who is going to break the mould first and choose to forge new standards that nobody else is obliged to follow.

    final thought

      These common causes of stress happen everyday and nobody is immune to it. Whether it is the daily stress of endless to-do lists, the loss of a loved one, the clutter in your space, the struggle for physical energy, or the pressure of complying with standards that don’t seem natural, the most important thing to remember is that you are not alone in this, no matter what background or culture you belong to. It just takes courage to step out and create your own domain. Choosing to respond to situations without accustomed panic, anxiety and fear-based knee-jerk reactions can beat stress. Easier said than done but if one works on self-awareness, there would be more responding and less reacting. And a surefire curb on unnecessary stress.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • The Therapeutic Effects of Authentic Listening

    The Therapeutic Effects of Authentic Listening

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Listening can be as therapeutic, if not more, than conventional therapies. Research studies have validated the positive effects of reflective listening, client-centered therapy and motivational interviewing. I discuss some of these researched effects which my own clients experience. Here, the client has control of their healing, directs their own space and time, and accepts their sense of self out of their own volition.

    The noble act of listening is significantly underrated in our mainstream media. Speakers are more valued than listeners anywhere you go. We look at famous celebrities, industry experts and authorities by virtue of what they say, period. We put them up on a pedestal quoting their wisdom from sound bites, excerpts from books, public relations statements and interviews for the world to consume. We derive comfort, inspiration and escapism from the people we admire. We may want to be like them, get a bit of their luck, charm, money and beauty. And so we listen to what they say. But I’m here to say that you probably are the bigger hero in all of this. And what I wish is that you would use your tendency to listen more to the people you deal with everyday. You could change someone’s life and receive long-term satisfaction in return. Whether rich or poor, healthy or sick, crazy or not-so crazy, most people at this moment need someone to listen to them. Not only to share known causes of daily stress, listening authentically creates therapeutic effects admittedly verified by research studies. Research into listening is regularly published in scientific journals. The phenomenon has been labeled “motivational interviewing”, “reflective listening”, “client-centered” or “non-directive therapy” based on humanistic psychology principles of Carl Rogers (1951). The core idea is that therapists need to accept their client’s situation with empathy. There are some key differences in these therapies and my practice as a Listener. For example, I refrain from summarizing the client’s point and neither do I ask questions of them. But similarities are well noted and have been proven in their therapeutic value.

    The following effects are commonly demonstrated in my own practice and those verified by research.

    Openness and Trust

    Prior to an official session, I orient my clients about what is expected. Most therapists do not conduct such communication. Clients instead are put through laborious psychometric testing backed by the assumption that something wrong needs to be found out. As a professional Listener who strives to practice authentically, I find that all of my clients let their guard down after an orientation session. The main message of this session is to let the client know that I am not looking to identify their “problem”. What they are going through is normal in their humanity. When this message is communicated effectively, my clients already feel a sense of openness and trust. This makes it less resistant for them to share their most intimate emotions. It also offers realistic expectations from our association with no anticipation of a magic pill.

    Control of Direction

    The client is in total control with an authentic listener at the other end. Now is a good time to reiterate over and over how this is central to the listening process. Unlike other practices, the way I execute in a session is to allow the client to direct the time they have with me. This means I do not probe, do not ask questions, do not direct the client to speak about one topic only and do not interrupt what is being said. The only way I would do any of the aforementioned is if I was asked to do so (sometimes this does happen when new clients are adapting to this sense of having control of their time). How is this control therapeutic? It provides raw freedom. And with that comes motivation to make an effort to face their sense of self and take control of it. Once a client feels totally in control, direct each session as they like and talk without the pressure to stay ‘on topic’, it paves the way for clarity.

    Hope for Change

    With authentic listening, the biggest therapeutic effect is for clients to feel hope all by themselves. Hope for something new, hope for the future, hope for what they are yet to achieve or manifest. At the end of every session, most of my clients naturally guide themselves back to positivity. Nobody wants to end sessions on a sour note. That is how powerful it is for clients to be conscious of time and direct each session. The rate of wanting to change, hope, strive for better is off the charts. When clients believe they have been heard and told that what they are is totally normal and human then they begin to want to do better. They want to change and continue to tell their story out loud, unraveling their progress be it a step or a whole new shift. Clients explore their internal ambivalence and have a high chance of resolving it when a Listener harbors unprecedented hope for their future.

    Normalcy

    The most cited therapeutic effect expressed by my own clients is simply the experience of normalcy. In other words, there is nothing ‘wrong’ with them. This is ingrained into their minds at the outset. When someone chooses to work with me, I make this crystal clear – what he or she is going through is absolutely normal and part of being human. The fact is that they are not alone in their situation because the world is filled with people who know exactly what they’re feeling. They aren’t the first person going through this and they won’t be the last. They may have come to my listening service on the back of being called ‘abnormal’, ‘different’, ‘pathological’, ‘disturbed’, ‘damaged’ or ‘psychotic’. So the best therapeutic effect has been bringing three important things into awareness – he/she won’t be labeled throughout this process, he/she is unique as a person, and he/she also has a unifying solidarity with people around the world going through similar circumstances. This sense of being normal in their situation is meaningfully therapeutic.

    Self-Understanding

    Authentic listening allows a client to understand himself or herself at a deeper level. This occurs as a result of vocalizing thoughts out loud, enabling them to speak to themselves as if they’re in front of a mirror. When I create a space for a client to organize his/her thoughts out in the open it usually results in self-acceptance out of their own volition. With greater self-understanding, the therapeutic effect is to make peace and realize the reality of their situation. Even if this realization brings up feelings of sadness or a wish for it to be different, the first step in healing it is to acknowledge its existence. The understanding of oneself has unparalleled therapeutic effects as the choices, options and decisions based on this understanding become permissible and admissible. New meaning and purpose can derive from self-understanding and it is common to witness my clients create new intentions.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. Acceptance

    The core idea is that therapists need to accept their client’s situation with empathy. Most therapists look for abnormalities as soon as the client starts speaking.

    02. Guard Down

    What clients are going through is normal in their humanity. When this message is communicated effectively, my clients already feel a sense of letting the guard down.

    03. In Control

    Once a client feels totally in control, where they direct each session as they like and talk without the pressure to stay ‘on topic’, it paves the way for clarity and healing.

    final thought

      My greatest wish is for authentic listening to empower people to open up, get support and take control of their healing. Most of my clients have sought this out as an alternative to traditional psychotherapy. Conventional therapy looks for abnormalities to stick a label on those seeking professional help. Therapy is not for everyone and that’s why I do what I do. The act of listening is as therapeutic if not more, than psychotropic drugs, dishing out advice or following anyone else’s plan and pace of recovery but one’s own.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • When Friends and Family Judge You Without Knowing It

    When Friends and Family Judge You Without Knowing It

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    Friends and family are the closest people in your life. In their intention to mean well, they can end up judging and undermining you. Here are the top 5 incidences clients regularly express that have left them vulnerable around those they love.

    There’s no doubt that your friends and family can be your rock. In good times and in bad, true friends and genuine family will be there no matter what. Relationships can make or break the way you face life. Even when you don’t seem to have a purpose, are lost or at a crossroads, life isn’t so bad when you have amazing people around you. Great friends make it easier to get through harrowing times. You laugh with them and share your achievements. You approach them for advice on the trivial and the significant. You are instantly comforted when they come around to help you to finish that daunting task. You are grateful that they cover for you when you just aren’t up to it. Real friends know your inner workings and support all your decisions, right? A great family can also be an amazing source of support and sometimes they are the only network you need. Whether it’s a job you’re looking for, or a blind date, family members can come to the rescue. And what about those amazing get-togethers on special occasions and holidays! There’s nothing like coming together with family and celebrating over sumptuous feasts. You get some of your habits, personality and attitude from your family as well, shaping you as a person. But of course, that’s all in an ideal world. For many others, friends and family have caused the most brutal betrayal, pain and hurt. Most of my first clients sought me out after being hurt by someone they knew, loved and trusted. This has been one of the major motivations in scaling my professional listening practice globally. Speaking to a stranger after a loved one hurt them proved hugely cathartic for many of my clients. A stranger doesn’t know your past and has no connection to your friends or family and this made the experience a cleansing one. I wrote all about this in one of my earlier blog posts: Why Strangers Make Better Listeners. Apart from extreme cases of betrayal and pain, people tell me what they feel by those they love on a daily basis too. Much vulnerability is experienced by subtle and covert behavior that leads one to feel undervalued by those they are most close to. And they do it all unknowingly, without intending to and with no realizations after the fact. Many of my current clients have expressed their mild frustration at the subtle ways they are judged everyday by family and friends.

    Here are 5 common incidences related to me by clients over the past year where friends and family leave them feeling judged without knowing it.

    Appearance

    So many of us garner self-confidence and social recognition from the effort we take to dress and look great. I hear stories on a regular basis related to this issue, and how friends will comment on that zit on their face or that top they wore that made them look heavier on an off day. “I want to be myself and be accepted just the same when I don’t look or feel my best” is a common complaint. Now you might consider the people who would comment or criticize you on any aspect of your appearance not to be a real friend. Friends do not intend to make you feel less than you are, even though I personally witness this kind of covert commenting happening all the time. It’s okay to want to dress down, or want indulge in a carb fest with tons of ice cream in front of everybody. And they ought to love you for living in and feeling the moment.

    Expected Social Behavior

    If you are having an awkward day or not in the mood to socialize, friends and family can get overbearing. And many a time, they will chastise you for cancelling on them at the last minute if you genuinely do not feel like going to a social engagement that was planned. The first reaction alludes to them believing that you are being deliberately selfish and uncompromising. Friends and family need to understand that as a human being, you are free to change your mind. “Unless someone is dying, I don’t get to change my mind or decline.” is what I hear all the time. Ironically, one of the most anxiety-inducing feelings is the dread of going to family gatherings especially on holidays. You are expected to attend without question, particularly in cases where your presence is required to represent your own family at these occasions. This is an all too familiar form of judgment and has left many of my clients feeling vulnerable.

    Major Life Change 

    If you experience a major change – such as weight gain or weight loss, or sudden shifts in your money situation, getting married or divorced, or a slight alteration in your opinion or viewpoint – it can affect how family and friends relate to you afterward. Family and friends are the first to take notice and bring up all the nuances of how your life-changing event will now alter the person you are, the new schedule you would now have to follow and drumroll… the new people who are sure to enter or exit your life. These reactions are natural. It is healthy to talk about life changes with your real friends. It is unfortunate however that many men and women feel undermined by their friends’ reactions to major shifts in circumstances. It is more common than you’d think, with reactions ranging from jealousy to despondency to downright indifference or nonchalance. The point is that friends have invested part of their life in you and when you undergo a major transformation, they may have lost some of that investment and subsequently choose to cope by unintentionally passing judgment.

    Insist on Giving Advice

    Close friends and family have deservedly earned a sense of entitlement on account of the relationship. So when it comes to providing their opinion, out it comes without a filter. Again this is the most natural instinct. Most friends will give you their two cents taking the liberty they’ve earned. Sometimes, the advice is unsolicited and forced upon you without you asking for it. Friends and family may believe they are entitled to tell you things that are in your best interest, but this isn’t always the case and they aren’t aware of it. “My best interest is mine alone” is what I hear clients tell me. When friends mean well by insisting on advice, clients have come to me feeling like pushovers in some instances. It gets complicated when they attempt to tell friends that they don’t necessarily need their advice at this time, which puts a strain on things for a while.

    Account of Give and Take

    Many friendships and relationships are built on the ideal of reciprocity. A good solid friendship is about maintaining a healthy balance between give and take. In fact, the value and quality of friendships are usually assessed by how much you’ve done for them and vice versa. Not many people realize that this equation is a form of subtle criticism, denoting the conditionality of friendship. When problems arise, the first weapon of defense is usually the “after all I did for you” card. It is a classic guilt-inducing mechanism riddled with the burden of defending yourself. What you do for your friends is definitely a way to build a friendship, but it is also used viciously when the time comes to settling a pressure point.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. Covert

    Much vulnerability is experienced by subtle and covert behavior that leads one to feel undervalued by those they are most close to.

    02. Freedom

    Friends and family need to understand that as a human being, you are free to change your mind if you genuinely feel off.

    03. Best Interest

    Friends and family may believe they are entitled to tell you things that are in your best interest, but this isn’t always the case.

    final thought

      That’s what close friends and family members do not only because they mean well, but also because it fulfills their own emotional needs. So what should be done about it? I say there’s nothing to do about it but to be aware that the people who love us the most can unknowingly put us down without meaning to. Judgment, criticism and condescension don’t have to manifest loudly. They can also show up in softer ways through the people we love and could affect us just as deeply.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • How To Select Your Professional Listener

    How To Select Your Professional Listener

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    To choose the right Listener for your needs, follow these 5 big steps. Take note of questions to ask and traits to observe. A true Listener behaves unlike anyone you know personally. She does not indulge in sarcasm, judgement or any kind of patronizing. She also has a spiritual outlook with a purpose to accept your soul needs.

    If you are familiar with how professional listening works, you probably know how vital it is to select the right practitioner for your healing experience. In this post, I address what an authentic Listener should be able to demonstrate. For those of you new to this alternative method of therapy, I urge you to sign up for a free call with me about the benefits of working with an authentic Listener. A Listener acts as your mirror and reflects a better version of you. She wants to empathize in the truest way possible, by putting herself in your mindset, emotional state and thought pattern. She is required to exhibit absolutely no judgment on your story, situation or state. She stays with you in the moment and meditates on what you are revealing to her. Out of this process, you should experience greater relief and clarity on any situation big or small. The answers, conclusions or closure will emerge out of your own self as you sort through what you are experiencing in the body, mind and soul. Now that you have a gist of what a Listener does, what is the best way to select the right one? Before we get to that, why is it important to even go through a selection process? Can’t you just look one up, hire her and see how it goes? Take your time choosing the right person to work with because you want to experience a real difference in your day, week, month, year into your life. Trying out various practitioners and deciding they weren’t for you will affect your motivation to get the relief and clarity you deserve. So find the right one the first time and stick with her. A Listener will be your keeper of secrets, the person you will share every emotion with along with every dream, regret, joy, craze and belief. Unlike a psychotherapist, a Listener holds as much space as you need and let’s you process the way you want to as opposed to some type of prescribed way. Let’s get into how you go about selecting one.

    Understand What You Need

    The reason you need to take your time selecting a Listener is that you will want to know what you want out of this association first. If you are looking for an expert to medicate you, label you and tell you what to do, a Listener will not help. People who seek Listeners do not want therapy, advice or any type of recovery plan. If your goal is to purely experience relief and clarity on a regular basis minus the judgment, a professional Listener is your ideal option. Please understand that this method is not for everyone. You might be someone who needs somebody else to tell you what to do, how to be and what to feel. But if you have gone through this route in the past and ended up feeling misjudged, undervalued or overwhelmed, then go ahead and look for a professional Listener.

    Shortlist Listeners with These Questions

    The shortlisting process might seem straightforward but do not do this randomly. Via email, a free call or in a personal meeting, do yourself a favor and demand clear answers to the questions outlined in the section below. If they answer in a copy-paste general kind of way or do not care enough to explain details, it shows that the candidate is impatient and frustrates easily. Do not waste your time if you are not satisfied with the quality of their responses. There are many wannabe practitioners who think that Listening is an “easy job”. Let’s get into these questions, why you should be asking them and what responses you should be looking for.

    Question #1. Why are you in this profession?

    An authentic Listener chooses this profession because of their desire to fulfill a deep purpose. Find out what their purpose is. For me, my purpose is the spiritual practice of non-judgment. I do that by bringing relief and clarity to others without the stigma and labeling that comes with psychotherapy. If you resonate with their deep purpose, you’ve found a potential match.

    Question #2. What is your philosophy of right and wrong?

    No matter what your Listener’s core beliefs, she must have a clear philosophy on ethical relativism. The answer to look for would be “there is no ultimate right and wrong” even if you yourself don’t believe such! This question is extremely tough on both parties and brings out a lot of sensitivities. Take your time and digest their answer. Then try to work out if this candidate is capable of letting you have your own truth, your own right and wrong. It is crucial in your process to get clarity.

    Question #3. What do you believe happens when people die?

    In my book, the best Listeners are practicing spiritualists who believe that death is not the end. Watch out for overly religious beliefs, like there is a physical heaven and hell that people get sorted into after death for example. Again, let me stress here that even if you believe in this, your Listener should not. Believing in an entity that stands in judgment of you now or ever does not make for an authentic Listener. Similarly, if she tells you that you are punished due to bad deeds from previous lives, it is a sign that she has judgment in her bones.

    Question #4. What is the difference between a Listener and a psychologist, life coach, therapist, counselor, astrologer, energy healer, or psychic?

    Your candidate has got to be clear on this. Listeners are not any of these other professionals. Psychologists, counselors and therapists have a prescribed way to make you process and rely on their stringent educational training to move you forward. A life coach lets you get to your own answers but not before they also use prescribed tools and ask you leading questions. Astrologers and psychics advise you and predict life events. Although this might bring relief, it also brings on anxiety with the concept of immutable fate. An energy healer works with your aura and positive effects are felt primarily in your body with no opportunity to express your thinking. Your Listener should know what distinguishes their profession – no judging, no labeling, no diagnosing, no telling, no asking, no predicting, no advising, no disapproving, no medicating, no questioning, no explaining and no interrupting.

    Question #5. Are there any issues that are off limits to talk about?

    This question is another indicator of whether your candidate has tendencies to judge. There should be absolutely no subject that is off limit. For example, I personally get asked a lot about whether I would report illegal behavior or intentions expressed to me by a client. Unlike a psychotherapist, I do not consider it an obligation to report to authorities. Many find my stand controversial and even disqualifying, which I respect as their prerogative. Part of my professional practice is to tell my clients that I have heard it all and there is no topic off limit. When I mean there is no judgment, I really mean it to the core. So if your Listener says that she will not serve particular groups of people or will not address controversial topics, she is not an ideal choice. Remember, even if you have a problem with certain people or topics, your Listener should not! At this stage, you know what your’re looking for and have perused the answers of your candidates to those important questions. Now its time to shortlist down to 2 practitioners you see yourself working with. If you have more shortlisted, push yourself to pick 2 based on the most complete, confident and convincing answers to the questions above. You really do need to hone your selection down to 2 before the final following steps.

    Test the Listening Service Protocol

    With your 2 final practitioners, you will now want to explore what you would experience working with them. Most Listeners will give you a free or low-cost first session. Here, it is important to notice how they conduct themselves, how they react to what you’re revealing, and if you feel truly understood. Let’s get into some character traits that you might watch out for during your first session. You should be able to answer “YES” to these trait questions –

    Trait #1. Is she really listening?

    This question can be rephrased as ‘Is she really empathizing?’ As you talk to your Listener, watch for whether she laughs when you laugh and sighs when you sigh. A Listener is a mirror and should echo you. She should express the intent of feeling what you’re feeling regardless of whether the logic makes sense to her or not. For e.g. if you were to ask her, “Am I ok in feeling this way?” she should absolutely be telling you to feel your emotions completely and not make any attempt at changing your state.

    Trait #2. Does she stay clear of advising you?

    It is cardinal for a professional Listener to stay away from giving you her opinion or advice on your situation. Giving advice is akin to patronizing in the listening process and should be avoided at all times. As you speak to your candidate, throw in a little test question like “What would you advise me to do?” If she starts offering explanations and justifications about your situation, this constitutes a big red flag. Any kind of “I think you should do this or do that” is a no no and you should easily eliminate this candidate as your Listener. Sometimes however, you will get the urge to ask her “What the !@#$% should I do?!” The ideal response from a true Listener would be along the lines of “If a stranger came to you with this situation, what would you advise them?” She should always be lovingly throwing the question back at you. A Listener believes that you are capable of finding your own truth, answers, conclusions and closure.

    Trait #3. Does she allow silence?

    Awkward silences are the healing grounds for professional Listeners. If during the course of your session you decide to stop speaking and stay with your emotions, your Listener should be leaving you be. Any attempts at filling silence with questions, prompts, probing or initiating new conversation is another sign that the candidate is not comfortable with leaving you to process your thoughts. Your Listener should find it completely natural to operate periods of silence during your session. I call this ‘holding the space’. She needs to allow you the space of silence and this invariably lets you come to your best conclusions, answers or the closure you yearn for.

    Tune Into Your Sixth Sense

    If you’ve followed the previous steps properly, you will be feeling pretty confidant about who you want to work with. But in the rare case of confusion and indecision, this step will resolve all doubt. Selecting the practitioner you’d like to work with is about connecting with their spirit, energy and flow, rather than their years of experience or their payment plan. So here’s what you do – observe how you respond upon hearing their voice or seeing their picture. If you choose to video, observe their body language and check out how long they can sit still for. The ability to keep still, listen with intent and meditate on what you are saying is significant. Your intuition and natural bodily response will tell you who the right Listener is.

    Create a Clear Contract

    Once you have chosen the one practitioner you want as your Listener, the last step is to iron out the details of your association. This is the only time you and your Listener will have two-way communication. Get clear on the terms of your agreement. Without this clarity, you will run the risk of jeopardizing your healing experience. The last thing you want is for an administrative or financial misunderstanding to rear its head while you are already deep in a regular schedule. You also need to express your expectations during your sessions loud and clear before you start. For example, you might ask her to start each session in a ritualistic way every time, or tell her how you expect an acknowledgement of your revelations so that you know you are being heard correctly. Hope this article has given you the tools to take control of your healing journey and the confidence to begin the search for your Listener!

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. Stick to one

    Trying out many practitioners will affect your motivation to get the relief and clarity you deserve. So find the right one the first time and stick with her.

    02. Own Truth

    She should let you have your own truth, your own right and wrong. In no way should she be influencing you into her way of thinking, belief system or life view.

    03. Distinguish

    Your Listener should know what distinguishes her profession from therapists, life coaches, psychologists, psychiatrists, energy healers or psychics.

    final thought

      Selecting a Listener to work with is ultimately about who your soul resonates with. Unlike other professionals, an authentic listener is your mirror, your keeper of secrets, your space holder. She acts like your personal diary who does not advise or talk back. She plays the role of your hidden consciousness and gives you access to your higher awareness. So it is so important that she accept all of you in whatever state you’re in or choose to be. Choose her wisely by examining her beliefs, methods and ability for stillness.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.

  • Why Add a Professional Listener to Your Mindfulness Practice

    Why Add a Professional Listener to Your Mindfulness Practice

    The following article is copyrighted. To reproduce any or all parts of the content, write to hello@listentruly.com

    You do not need to be a monk or a spiritual ninja to practice true mindfulness. A Listener will help you be mindful without you having to be an expert at supreme talents like meditation, concentration, relaxation, levitation, going under hypnosis or a past life regression. Be awake and get mindful by working consistently with a professional listener.

    Mindfulness is all the rage. I’ve heard so much on how it benefits every aspect of your life, to such an extent that a new kind of stress has developed – carving out time to be mindful. Imagine that! People don’t have the time to practice the one thing that really works. Doesn’t this sound like the funniest oxymoron? One thing is ever so true about us humans. We are naturally drawn to pressure. All of us are addicted to looking for the next stress inducer just so we can wage war to get over it. Think about it. When work calls, we’re the first ones there. When our family calls, we drop everything and go attend to our spouses and kids. When our health calls, we go worrying to our doctors to take the ailment away immediately. We react to stressors with fright or flight today even though we’re not Neanderthals anymore. Why? Well, it gives our brain the temporary message that we are useful, busy and important at this time. And hence the latest craze called mindfulness. I do not mean to sound sarcastic. Taking a break every hour, absorbing what’s outside your window for a sweet second, and meditating in a quiet place are all very noble suggestions. No matter how much we know about what works, it actually comes down to doing it. So have you ever set aside those precious 60 seconds to correct the wrong way you’ve been breathing all morning? Most of us aren’t able to find that red-hot minute effortlessly because remember, we are geared to look for unwanted stress. The ego that constantly asks you to prove you are powerful demands daily pressures on your body, mind and soul. So if we can’t even get to that red-hot minute, the practice of true mindfulness sounds like blatant wishful thinking. Consciously increasing your self-awareness of the present moment with total acceptance of what you are feeling sounds like it’s only reserved for ascended masters up in the Himalayas. What hope is there for us mortals? But there is hope. There may be a faster, deeper and more self-conscious way to true mindfulness without pretending to be a monk. And it involves our intense need to be understood and validated by someone else. I’m talking about working with a professional Listener. Not a counselor, psychotherapist, life coach or any kind of guru. Someone who offers pure empathy by listening to what’s on your mind even if you are all over the place… and not be judged, diagnosed, advised or told what to feel, be or do. Ok, so how does this work, and why should it work? Here are 5 situations in which to consider a professional Listener as a mindfulness resource.

    You are not successful at meditation

    Do you make regular time to meditate? And if you do, are you able to really mute out your thoughts on demand? If you are like most of us mortals, you might be able to keep your thoughts at bay for a few seconds but not much more. So you might as well get your thoughts out of your system and face the fact that you are thinking them. This is the first step to self-awareness anyway. Talking to a Listener regularly gives you an opportunity to sit down and tell yourself, “Now get aware of your thoughts”. Self-awareness is what mindfulness aims for but you probably would not do this by yourself unless you are a spiritual ninja.

    You think talking to yourself in front of a mirror is madness

    A big part of mindfulness is to face “who you are”. Spiritualists talk about mirror work, where you look into your favorite mirror and talk to your reflection, as if you are out of your own body looking down at you. This seems a tad bit crazy, weird and downright silly. But the real reason we don’t like this idea is fear of the warped things we’ll end up saying to our reflection, like “you are no good” or “you don’t deserve that position” or “at least I’ve got nice hair if not anything else”. We do end up beating ourselves up a lot of the time. Now if you had a compassionate Listener at the other end, you can get out of your own way and you do not have to face your reflection just yet. There’s another entity you can talk aloud to whose job it is to show you a better reflection of you. It will feel easier and lighter to speak to yourself through someone else who acts like your favorite mirror.

    You are not into journaling

    Another method mindfulness experts suggest is to maintain a daily journal of the day’s events and document how they made you feel. I personally love the idea of journaling, but many of my clients admit they do not do well with it. They can’t really face their feelings alone without hurt, anger or depression coming to the surface. At the end of it they tell me about feeling more isolated when nobody is around to share in the emotional journey. Journaling is a way to ‘take stock’ of your day or week allowing you to process at your own pace. A real Listener will be your real live ‘stock taker’ and the value is in the sharing of experiences. A Listener laughs when you laugh, offers space when you are tired, and empowers you to process the way you want. Telling your story each week to a real person builds resilience. You will go about your day with a knowing that every event, incident, feeling, experience, joy and challenge will be offloaded onto an actual human being who wants to be in your shoes.

    You don’t want just inner peace. You want validation

    Inner peace is the holy grail of mindfulness. But most of us in the real world first seek validation… for what we’re thinking, how we’re going about life and how we’re feeling. Inner peace is a far more herculean task if other human beings do not validate us first. The world knows humans are social animals who yearn for acceptance. A Listener wants to connect to your situation and offer acceptance, understanding and validation. Their job is to validate whatever you are feeling, thinking and doing. Sometimes you just want a neutral person to hear you out and simply agree, with no need for persuasion. Working with a Listener who keeps your inner piece leaves you freer for that inner peace.

    You have issues that are beyond therapy, coaching or medicine

    Some issues are too small or too big for conventional therapy. What issues are those that take you away from enjoying each moment? I believe there are many issues apparently unsolvable where a Listener can provide invaluable support. I call them “pattern issues”, i.e. situations you’ve faced your whole life that you can’t seem to get to the root cause of. Examples include chronic health niggles, relationship patterns you didn’t ask for, tendencies that you don’t like about yourself (laziness is a big one), etc. A Listener can help make patterns part of your persona by cutting out shame, blame, anger, guilt or resentment. Most clients come to me expressly not wanting therapy or coaching. They do not want to be diagnosed as having something “wrong” and neither do they want patronizing advice on how to “get shit done”. The sole purpose of a Listener is to fully understand and accept your present state, while staying in the moment with you. When someone is handholding you in your current state, it makes it much easier for you to stay present in the now.

    Summary of Article

    The Big Ideas

    01. elusive

    The ego that constantly asks you to prove you are powerful demands daily pressures on your mind. So the practice of true mindfulness sounds like blatant wishful thinking.

    02. the way

    There may be a faster, deeper way to true mindfulness without pretending to be a monk. And it involves our intense need to be understood and validated by someone else.

    03. awareness

    A Listener regularly gives you an opportunity to tell yourself, “Now get aware of your thoughts”. Just like mindfulness, self-awareness is what a professional listener wants for you.

    final thought

    You don’t need to be a spiritual ninja or a monk to access mindfulness. It’s not about momentarily getting your nature fix or walk away from the office either. Neither do you need the help of a therapist, motivational guru, life coach or psychologist if all you really want is to feel relief and clarity in the moment you’re in. The years it takes to perfect high end spiritual practices such as meditation and deep relaxation is daunting even though the outcome is rewarding. Get regular support by expressing yourself completely to an authentic Listener. You will experience amazing mindfulness as your self-awareness soars.

    Mubeena is the Founder of Listen Truly, helping adults get the clarity and relief they deserve without psychotherapy. She started working as a professional listener out of her need for spiritual growth and her desire to practice non-judgment. If you would like to learn more, sign up for a free orientation session.