ON LISTENING

How many people listen to themselves, let alone to others? Listening to oneself means having the courage to take seriously what the spirit is telling us. This is not the same as that clamour of voices, many internalised, that tell us how we 'ought' to live. That is what is called 'normal, it is highly judgemental and seems, by and large, to be the modus operandum of any society which wishes to remain stable - and confer a kind of psychological stability on its members. 

Of course, everyone thinks they listen, just as they think they are masters of their own lives. But it's often only when the Spirits intervene, forcefully if necessary - illness being a classic - that we realise that there is a whole other level of ourselves, and of others, that we hadn't been listening to. And that what came before was superficial and programmed. 

But I think the voice of Spirit is always there, it is that we get trained to ignore it. Deep down we often know that we are not being true to ourselves, and that can go on for years. Until it all starts to fall apart.