This Salon will host the Self Talk Virtual Workshop. Participants are encouraged to post Questions and Comment here prior to the workshop, or email your Questions or Comments to either of the workshop Facilitators srazaee@listen4achange.org and jerrycatt@listen4achange.org. During and following completion of the workshop, you are invited to engage in follow up conversation with other participants and workshop facilitators. Those desiring to do so may post excerpts from journal entries and responses to workshop assignments that others in the listening community may in turn take opportunity to learn from insights shared in this Salon.
Self-talk Virtual Workshop
by Jerry Catt | Nov 25, 2021 | Uncategorized | 9 comments
Welcome everyone! I am looking forward to meeting you all, making and renewing many meaningful connections.
I took a version of this workshop with Jerry years ago. I thought it’d be an easy ‘A’ because I already had a long history of talking to myself…. but I came to see that I never listened to myself. This was a great starting point for my journey.
Hi Eddie,
I have heard so much about you. I look forward to meeting you.
Welcome Everyone. Listening to myself is terrifying, exhilarating, peaceful, powerful and exhausting once I got to know. Through all of these feelings you’ll need to talk to others so that you can validate and verify within yourself.
Hi everyone. I’m looking forward to the workshop. Every conversation with Jerry is like a little listening boot camp, so I am excited to do the real thing. 🙂
Hello everyone,
It’s so nice to meet all of you. I love what Eddie said about just beginning the journey of listening to ourselves. I am in an interesting role of teaching others to do the same, but do I know how to truly listen to me? I am very intrigued and excited for the opportunity.
Two questions that come up: what if a person has been through trauma (as many of us have being on this planet at this time) and how do we overcome elements of defensiveness, fear, apprehension.
A second question is in relation to getting in touch with the “Holy Spirit” or in Vedic terminology the “Paratmatma” or super soul within when we truly listen. How do we make the differentiation between the mind, intelligence, ego, spirit or intuition and the true self? Do we talk or listen to all of these parts?
Thankyou Jerry and Saida for this wonderful opportunity.
Kristie it is so good to have you in our circle! I Apologize it’s taken me all day to reply here. I have been contemplating your questions and must apologize a second time that my most legitimate response is a deep sighhh! I recalled the Nectar of Instruction workshops you facilitated last summer and one of the vedantic terms we discussed was ‘vegam’ or ‘pushes’ if I got that correctly; there were six right? And the drift I got from the six vegams had to do with excess three of which were said to be hard to control: talking needlessly; undisciplined thought life or demands of the mind; and demands of the body. Certainly these have bearing on your first question in that our current traumas may be said to be traced back to these excesses in the first place (or so I would speculate); and the evidence I would bring is that the very ‘bodies’ and ‘minds’ are crying out as a result of both cultural practices and individual conformity to the ‘temptation’ to over indulge in most every area of life. I was really taken by the Swami’s remark that we learn that we may in turn teach; so I wonder that those traumas that lock onto our attention — body and mind — are teachings that may seem intolerable but are nonetheless asking us to learn and in turn tell others our experiences. Naturally, the question that raised for me was, “Well what good does it do to tell if there’s no one listening?” And I think that for me that leads to your second question, which I believe most of us can see that an ‘excess of talking’ (even the talking cure) hasn’t answered to the dilemma on a broad scale — so you can appreciate that my own ‘answering’ should be suspect — and I don’t mean that ironically at all. What I do believe I’ve learned from the Vedantic traditions has to do with bringing myself into a silence that I am not used to, and actually have only taken to heart in the last several years. I experience something that in turn is very difficult to qualify and for that reason I’m opting to turn to another listener who maybe speaks to your question at least in part. A longtime friend regularly observes a mindfulness practice that incorporates tools, which with use over time “helps us disengage from hooking into persistent thoughts, and, eventually quiets the busy mind.” Through her I was introduced to the yoga nidra practice and Jean Klein’s work which incited my interest and led me to explore her practice as it has everything to do with listening to one’s self talk. A particularly fruitful excerpt in Klein’s book, Ease of Being, has become meaningful despite I only casually attempted the yoga practice that was an urgent practice for her.
A question she asked is a case in point: “When and how does the mind enter into a sabbath rest?” One way this question has to do with listening is that when my mind is busy with my thoughts I’m not busied (preoccupied) on another’s. We are speculating in this Salon that a space of silence would be conducive to genuinely listening to ourselves just as it would be in giving space to others to express their meanings. The following view on silence is also worth reflection. Jean Klein was asked:
“How Can I Act In A Way That Doesn’t Create Further Reaction, Karma?” His response centers on this question of silence and genuine self awareness:
“Whenever love and kindness are in your heart, you will have the intelligence to know what to do and when and how to act. When the mind sees its limitations, the limitations of the intellect, a humility and innocence arise which are not a matter of cultivation, accumulation or learning, but the result of instantaneous understanding. The moment you see your helplessness, that nothing works, you come to a point of surrender, a stand-still, where you are in communion with silence, ultimate truth. It is this reality which transforms your mind, and not effort or decision” (Jean Klein 1984, p 28 italics added).
Authentic being such as characterized by Klein, entails nonconformity. I don’t know that I fully agree with Klein that there is an “ease” in achieving this level of authenticity or regard for silence, but I do embrace the significance of attempting to hold regard for both in the listening process. Quite ironically my reply here qualifies as an “excess of talking.” But I know too that you are a person that practices ‘compassion’ and feel confident you’ll give this a listening and hopefully bring our conversation back to some juxtaposition with the “Paratmatma.” I returned to some notes I had taken at the NOI workshop and found at the very outset that “a vow of silence” was urged in the face of these vegams that are torturing us to perhaps restore a transcendental dimension to our learning that is likely designed to bring us to our senses and restore our senses of community. What I do deeply believe is that only through listening is that likely to happen. I do look forward to your reflections as we continue brooding this weekend!
I’m slightly over two years late joining this conversation, but I’m inclined to respond for multiple reasons. One is for the simple fact that I have missed Jerry’s conversations immensely, as well as the variety of perspectives that join together.
Listening from the space of stillness you speak of is the most profound and sacred state of being. Judgment doesn’t exist there, nor does offense or insecurity, so authenticity and discovery are given easily without fear.
And although it seems to be a work in progress for most of us to let go of the habitual workings of the mind, (we so identify with) it’s nice to know that it gets easier with practice.
The best conversations, experiences, and wisdom arrive from the space of stillness, so it seems to be the ultimate gift to give to anyone.
We are really never too late to give our attention to a conversation. How is it then we fail so often at meeting and listening with ourselves? Sometimes we go for years missing out on that conversation. We need to be compassionate with ourselves too knowing It’s going to take our whole lives to become accomplished at listening from stillness, anyway. I thought by now I would be really good at it. The good news is we are all in this together.