8.4 Exploring Future Experiential Learning Activities for Listening to Self

I chose five experiential activities from the chapter on Listening to Self as starting points for expanding and developing additional experiential learning activities.

Les Femi’s “open focus” concept can be expanded to include a “heart-centered” open focus for listening.^[1] The import of the heart in receiving emotional information while listening is profound:

Emotional information sent from the heart to the brain profoundly affects higher brain functions, influencing our perceptions, thought processes, health, learning abilities, and . . . our ability to feel compassion and empathy.^[2]

A heart-centered, open-focus mediation activity is described by Femi.^[3] With regular practice, this activity should enhance the ability to listen to self and also enhance the ability to listen to others, nature, and the Divine.

In another listening activity, Pierau’s advice to “check in” with ourselves to ensure we have enough energy to listen can be extended to include basic self-care to improve energy levels and the ability to listen.^[4] Dave Asprey’s Head Strong is a guide to bulletproofing our bodies and minds through unusual types of self-care.^[5] A sample of these unusual forms of self-care that can enhance our ability to listen are:

• • Intermittent fasting for “. . . mitochondria make energy more efficiently with ketones than they do with glucose. . .”
  • Sweating in a sauna to remove “. . . lead, cadmium, arsenic, and mercury . . .”
  • Consuming bulletproof coffee “rich in polyphenols and contains over a thousand different compounds that improved the function of your cells.”^[6]
  • I invite readers to experiment with these intriguing ideas and assess how they impact their energy levels and listening ability. For example, does drinking one cup of bulletproof coffee daily for five days in a row result in increased energy and higher levels of alertness for listening to others?

In addition to monitoring our short-term energy levels, we can attend to long-term issues related to the self that impact our listening. Ken Wilber et al.’s lines of human development suggest multiple ways of assessing cognitive, emotional, physical, and spiritual selves.^[7] Knowledge of the strengths and shortcomings in our “lines of development” sharpens the ability to adjust our listening to self and others. Wilber et al. also suggest how to translate the way we speak to the other person’s “type (such as sensing or intuitive types), state (e.g., ecstatic versus melancholy), quadrant focus (e.g., We versus It language), lines (e.g., musical and mathematical languages), and levels (e.g., Amber versus Green language . . .).”^[8]

Another experiential activity for exploring the self is Mossbridge’s reflection questions to create a portrait of our authentic self.^[9] In addition to understanding our authentic self, we need to know the fundamental maintenance requirements of the self. Mossbridge suggests creating a User’s Guide for this purpose.^[10] Such a guide assists in optimizing our energy levels to be fully present in our listening.

Lastly, the meditation section on listening to self includes several possible meditation practices to explore as experiential self-listening. Jeff Warren’s Calm meditations and Kabat-Zinn’s mindfulness represent some of these meditation practices.^[11] Additional meditation resources to explore are Shinzen Young’s Unified Mindfulness online program, Susan Kaiser-Greenland’s mindfulness for children, parents, families, and teachers, Joseph Goldstein’s practical mindfulness, and Thich Nhat Hanh’s peace-filled mindfulness meditations.^[12]