Saturday, September 13, 2014

Learning to Listen

In our day-to-day, we seemingly go through the motions engaged in many things we think are so important.  We become mired in the egotistical dramas and plays projected onto our field of existence by ourselves and by others.  We participate without thinking either on the offense or in defense as each situation may call us to do and while we do it, in our strategizing and striving we’re forgetting something important… the “still small voice.”

There is more to the “still small voice,” our thoughts and our actions than achieving some goal that either we create or is created by others for us to aspire to.  There are multiple levels and layers of consciousness that we remain mostly unaware of as we live our lives each day.  Our minds hold our consciousness, our bodies hold a level of consciousness, our souls hold a consciousness and our spirits hold a consciousness.  Each of these levels represent the concept of the still small voice and each aspect of consciousness speaks in it’s own language.  If we do not learn how to listen, we may encounter some uncomfortable or otherwise dire results in our efforts.

Each of the levels of consciousness that I ascribe to the “still small voice” as I’ve described comprise a highly collaborative system of being or existence, if you will.  The mind thinks and sets forth an energy pattern that influences our actions based on our assumptions and perceptions.  The body’s consciousness in collaborative harmony with the mind’s consciousness will manifest through physical and sometimes emotional feeling.  The soul’s consciousness is beyond the consciousness of the day to day but it can be felt through true and pure emotion that is not egotistically based in any way, shape or form.  The spirit’s consciousness is much more global and also uses a language of energy that influence not only the being that it is part of a person but everyone and everything around the being or person.


Each of these levels of consciousness is always in constant collaboration with the other, constantly communicating messages back and forth and creating through this collaboration, our experiences here in life.  If we cannot hear what the deeper messages are for us, we may end up sick, stressed out, ulcers, cancer or other things we really don’t care to deal with or walking into untenable situations for us.  Now having said that, I cannot discount that each soul has set itself up with a specific series of experiences from which to learn in this life.  If one wishes to learn from the cancer experience, it is not wrong thought or ignoring messages that creates the cancer.  It is just the being wished to create an experience for itself and through learning to listen, one can come to greater and more peaceful learning from the experience.  Speaking from experience, in my own case I chose a series of lessons of involvement with certain types of interactions unconsciously from the conscious mind’s perspective.  There was an experience I wished to have I was completely unconscious of but once I learned the languages, the other ways in which consciousness spoke, I started to grasp the lessons before me much more quickly and much less painfully, I might add.

Let me give you a more specific example.  Let’s say someone is told their whole life by others that they must achieve a certain position or possessions in order to be recognized or loved.  A person who engages in those endeavors may achieve the results and yet find stress and anxiety or insomnia has taken hold.  In this kind of example, what you have is the body’s consciousness speaking and know that it does not speak alone.  While consciously one may be unaware of the other consciousness aspects speaking, the body or the mind can start to experience messages solely intended to get one’s attention.  If you can see or feel the message, you can give yourself pause to say, “Hmmm, if I am achieving all I set out to do with this goal or that aspiration, why am I not happy, sleeping or enjoying life?  That is the intent of the message of body manifesting messages through mental challenges such as anxiety or depression and other possibly physical symptoms as well.

When you learn how to listen to the whole of the “still-small-voice,” you can avoid some of the negatives or even if you experience the negatives (which are a normal part of existence), you can learn to deal with them more effectively.  You can deal with them more effectively by becoming more conscious of your own internal messaging system.  If your behavior is incongruent with the truest desires of your spirit or soul, they’ll begin to speak until they find a way for you to consciously understand (Now do you understand life’s repeating lessons?).  In this way, you will never allow yourself to truly let yourself down no matter what it is that you face.  You have an amazing consciousness system that communicates with you all the time about your environment, energy, people and situations and not just from the limited ego-judgmental perspective.  That is only one small form of the conscious communication system.  What you want is to understand the communication of the “still small voice” so that you can learn to respond to what you face (stay in your own light or power) rather than reacting to it (not staying in your own light or power).  When the egoic mind alone is in charge disregarding all other parts of the consciousness communications going on, you are forever reacting, taxing your energy and biological systems, becoming more mired in the illusions of perceptions and assumptions and can lead yourself down some pretty dark and treacherous roads. 

Through learning how to listen to all aspects of the consciousness communication systems that are part of who you are, you will always make it back home to peace, bliss, joy, serenity, understanding and compassion.  One of the greatest ways to learn how to listen is to understand when you are clearly not listening.  If you are reacting, tired, stressed, sick, etc., it’s possible you are not really listening to the guidance so readily available to you that can help you understand and cope.  Another fantastic way to learn how to listen is meditating.  Taking up a practice every day of stopping all thought, learning to listen for the “still small voice” and even asking your higher consciousness systems to speak more meaningfully or obviously to you, you will start to understand the language.  It takes time, patience and willingness to benefit from the communications.  The reality is that whether you consciously learn to listen or not, the system itself will still find a way to get you the message.  The difference is a matter of control and the only thing you truly have the power to control is you.

I suggest that you take the time to fully understand how it is that you communicate with you.  All the wonder and magic that is YOU, will never let you down.  Mind your thoughts, stay open to learning to understand the language of the various consciousness systems through intent and then begin the noticing, the timing and the many ways in which you naturally and always speak to yourself and guide yourself in a positive light.  Remember, when it is the egoic consciousness involved, you are reacting.  When it is the other consciousness or higher consciousness involved, you are self and other-compassionate and more understanding and open…and thus, much more willing to hear the “voice” within.  Listen.  You truly have so much to say to you and you are worth listening to.  ~Blessings.

Rev. J.L. Harter, PhD, M.Msc., B.Msc., Author, Blogger, and Spiritual Counselor, Editor of the JMCC.  See Bio section for more information.
© 2014, J. L. Harter
(Photo, http://psychicpowernetwork.info)