When I was 20 something and
living in Ljubljana, I got into a dispute with my landlady. In the heat of the
moment I must have said some really mean stuff to her, because what she said
then in a very calm and soothing voice still echoes in my mind. “You’ll see,
that tongue of yours will hit you in your life!” I did not know what she
meant then so I simply grinned at her disbelievingly.
When I was a kid, I had a similar experience. I
remember it was Sunday. I know that, because Sundays were the only days that
the whole family sat down and had a family Sunday lunch together. We had the
traditional meat soup, followed by mashed potatoes and cooked meat from soup -
a true peasant’s lunch. Somehow I got upset with my mom and again in the heat
of the moment I called her “a goat” (in Slovenian language that is quite an insult).
She just looked at me and said: “You know, if you hit me, the pain will go
away, but words, they stay. You can never take them back!” One would’ve
thought, I’d learned back then. Obviously I had not. It is easy to lose the
perspective, when one is overwhelmed with emotion.
The pain we feel after the words have been said come
from regret that we hurt people we love the most. Remorse is then futile. One
cannot take words back. No matter how un-meant they were, no matter how un-true
they were, no matter how un-anything they were. Any explanation looks like a
cheap excuse. No “I am sorry” can ctrl+Z it. Words were thought, said and
received. They were then taken, interpreted and became a catalyst of physical manifestation
called emotion. Sure, my mom has forgiven me; sure my landlady did so, too. Or
maybe she simply forgot that awful boy that caused her pain. No matter how
justified those words seemed to me at that moment, in the aftermath I felt
terrible. I felt ashamed and I felt sad that people, who allowed me to be even
a smallest part of their life, were hurt only because I was angry,
dissatisfied, unfulfilled and childish.
That got me thinking. It is not the words that we say
that are the problem. The problem seems to be rooted in a previous state of the
conversation. Once emotions overflow us barriers are already lifted and the tsunami
like wave of destruction has been released. In order not to succumb to it, one
has to listen first. One needs to keep the calm inside and listen. That is how I
learnt the importance of being silent. Let me explain.
There is a Chinese proverb that says: “There is a
reason why we have two ears and one mouth!” I know the reason is more
biological than philosophical, but the mentioned distribution has some deeper
meaning to it, too. Yes, one should listen twice as much as one talks. I don’t
think it is necessary to lay down the evidence, that that is not the case in
this society. However, my intention is not to point fingers, since I myself am
the same as everyone else. Nevertheless I believe the important question is
hidden in understanding the words “listen” and “talk”.
Word “listen” means using our ears that receive sound
waves and focus them on the talker. That is listening. But that is only the
first part of the communication process. The important part happens afterwards.
We need to hear, too. And that is where the problem emerges. Hearing
includes understanding. To make the process even more complex, there are two meanings
to understanding. The first is, to understand the words in order to comprehend
what is said and then translate it in our brain to the images we then take as a
message. The other one involves “understanding beyond words”. What that means
is, one needs to realize the motive behind those words. I am not talking
analysis here. You see, when one analyses the words, one usually makes many
mistakes, as I have explained in one of my previous blog entries. When one
analyses the words, one assumes to understand, where in fact the ability to
assume is set in one’s perception of his own reality that by default excludes
the one of talker. What “understanding beyond words” means, is realizing that
everybody talks from his perception of reality, his own experiences. In fact it
has been proven that, when we talk, we talk about ourselves, never about
others. Even when we actually talk about other people, it is always about our
perception of them or our experience with them. What makes the situation even trickier;
we also understand everything from the same point of view. Ours, that is. We
hear what we want to hear, we understand what we choose to understand. There is
no absolutely objective talk. Only the talk, stripped of all emotion, when one
talks about anything as a simple observation of facts, gets close to being objective.
The rest is ego noise. What “understanding beyond words” asks us to do, is to take
into consideration that everyone talks from their pain.
What does that imply about conversation? It means to
simply listen, but not to listen. What that means is that we should not inflict
anything onto ourselves. We should not take anything personally, even if it is
aimed at us. If we take everything that someone says as a part of their pain,
might it be caused in the past or in this very moment, we are then filled with
compassion and understanding. It does not however mean we have to agree to
everything someone says. Simply understand. With understanding comes calmness
in our head and love in our heart.
Of course sometimes it happens that many people say
something to us about us. That we can take as a good pointer, but if you do not
cause suffering to yourself or others(!), then there is no need for you to
change or adjust. In that case, you are simply surrounded by the wrong crowd. If
you inflict pain to yourself and do nothing about it, then bear your own
suffering, it is yours and you have an opportunity to choose different path
with every word you are saying. And if you inflict pain on others, believe me,
they will either push you into change or they will leave. No one likes suffering.
So where in all of this is silence? Well, it is hidden
in “active listening”. To be silent doesn’t mean we shouldn’t talk at all. It
means that, while one is talking, we listen without noise in our heads. We do
not interrupt; we lead no inner monologue, when one says something you do not
like. The point of conversation is not sharing your opinion or showing how
smart you are, but listening and only coming to a conclusion after the point got
across.
When I took a seminar on meditation, we had an
exercise. We were divided into random chosen couples and we were supposed to
lead a conversation. The goal of this exercise was to not say anything until
the talker (he was selected through a toss of a coin) finished. We were
supposed to listen for as long as he was talking. You know how one feels, when
doing that exercise? It is excruciating. You have to ignore your own flow of
thoughts and suppress the need to say something, when you feel the talker said
something you do not agree with, because you are always right in your mind.
What makes this exercise amazing is the realization that, by the time talker
finished talking, you have already forgotten, what you wanted to say. And you
know what that says about your thoughts? They were not that important to begin
with. Suddenly your egotistical need to be the smartass, the helper, the wise
or the arguer, or simply to object, subsided. There was such peace and
fulfillment in my mind.
Suddenly, you remember things the talker said. You are
armored with understanding, so it is easier to develop a sincere compassion,
because you know the pain he is talking from. And then miraculously, you talk
about his issue, sharing your own experience on that; and he listens. Like a
wonder your conversation finds its own way to any problem without saying
anything. Or you can disagree, but nevertheless, you understand. And what is
even more important, you have no emotional reaction to it. You simply let it
flow over you.
This exercise shows you, that you are not needed. Your
opinion is not needed. Your ego is not present. You are simply there; nothing
more. What is more, you find out, that we are not that different at all. We all
share same suffering. In the end, we all simply want to be loved and better
ourselves.
I must confess it is hard to keep that in mind all the
time, especially when great emotions, like love, are involved. The customs are
the worst to get rid of. But somehow I managed to stop blaming people for the
words they say. I don’t take anything personally. I still react to them; I have
the right to, especially when people get mean. However I do not react in anger
or sadness. I might be irritated, but I let it wash over me in few minutes. I
might say sometimes, that I am sad, but I am not really sad. I am not crying.
Maybe I am simply disappointed, because my expectations have not been met. But
that is another issue worth discussing next time.
I would like to conclude, that I have no regrets over
the things I said. I understand why I did them and I got a better look into my
own issues. That is the only way we learn. And I cannot promise, I will not
repeat them, but at least I am on the way to once cease doing that. I am more
careful. But time to time, I get into the situation I face for the first time.
I never want to hurt anyone intentionally, though. Because in the end the hurt
I feel is mine. The pain I feel is over my inability to learn faster and
wondering why I succumb to the emotional states that prevent me to be silent.
So yes, my tongue hits me in a way. So I should stop doing that in order to not
feel pain.
It saddens me sometimes, though, that I am not
listened to; that my partner in conversation doesn’t take time to really listen
to me. In the
end, I can only take responsibility for my actions, decisions and words I say,
but not someone´s interpretation of them. I cannot help it, if they weren´t
listening. One should always thrive on understanding not judging. After all, I
am talking from my own pain, too.
And there is that.
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