Communication 101
The dharma talk at the zen center today was Communication – a chapter in Zen Mind Beginner’s Mind by Suzuki Roshi. “When you listen to someone,” he says, “you should give up all your preconceived ideas and your subjective opinions, just observe what his way is… Just see things as they are with him, and accept these. This is how we communicate with one another… A mind full of preconceived ideas, subjects, intentions, or habits is not open to things as they are.”
I don’t know anyone who listens this way, who isn’t poised ready with their own litany of things to say just waiting for their turn to jump in. There are those who jump uninvited, there are those who sit back waiting for their turn, there are those who never hear a word you are saying.
Imagine listening to someone speaking to you without having any agenda, any response, any desire to do anything but hear them. It’s a startling departure from the every day.