When I listen to music I practice in listening thoughtlessly, avoiding all efforts to understand or judge. I shun everything which requires the use of my mind or thoughts. The ‘filter’ between the music and me is opened entirely, bringing me into a different state of mind. It enables me to react differently from what I would normally do. I can skip the need to have an opinion about the music, it can pass through me unobstructed. It can touch me without needing words because each word would close my mind just that little bit, it adds up, too many words would block me.
In this same way I try to listen to people. Words are necessary in normal (reacting) reality. When I
teach, give a lecture or simply engage in conversation I listen at 2 levels of consciousness: the layer filled with words and the wordless layer. In that second layer I listen mainly with my eyes.
I live and listen at two levels of consciousness: at the usual relationship level and the level of absolute reality i.e. at the level of ego; filled with different realities, large and small, and at the level without the ego; without the different realities, the level of unity and interdependency, the level of existence.
As I grow older and gather experience I become more and more aware of these two layers. During a morning in town I talk with several people whose name I do not even know but whom I am
nevertheless acquainted with. It gives me just as much pleasure as the intense contact with one of my students.
To me living means: listening with all my senses, without pushing myself forward at all. Listening is being attentive, creating space, laughing and crying together.
