8.5 Exploring Future Experiential Learning Activities for Listening to Others

There is an abundance of experiential learning activities in most listening textbooks that could be included in this section.^[1] Here, I describe experiential learning activities based on the singular topic of empathy covered in Chapter Four.^[2] First, I introduce Miller’s general empathy activities, followed by Sofer’s suggestion to “lead with presence.” Second, I develop Rosenberg’s mediation process focusing on empathic, heartfelt connection. Third, Kline provides instructions for creating a “thinking environment” where listening quality is marked by attention, no interruptions, silence, and encouragement. Finally, I borrow from the art of Aikido and Tai Chi to illustrate embodied empathic experiential activities.

In Chapter Four, several activities highlight the importance of empathy in listening to others. Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry William Miller’s Listening Well is one practical guide to empathic listening.^[3] The end of each chapter contains experiential empathic listening activities. For instance, the “Speaker and Helper” activity identifies roadblocks to empathic listening in an instructive and enjoyable way.^[4] Another activity called “Picture It” stretches our imaginal capacities by listening to the nonverbal behavior of a movie or television show with the sound and captions turned off.^[5] A variation of this activity is to listen to movies in a foreign language without captions. This mode of viewing has the advantage of listening to the emotion of the voice via paralinguistics^[6] without the additional cognitive effort of processing the literal meaning of the words.

Empathy as Leading with Presence

Meditation teacher Oren Jay Sofer brings Buddhist mindfulness and somatic healing practices to an understanding of nonviolent communication that enhances the ability to listen empathically with others.^[7] For instance, Sofer recommends beginning the listening process by “leading with presence.” By this, he means begin listening by sensing your own body. “Right now, as you read, can you be aware of the sensations of your body sitting? Perhaps you feel some heaviness or pressure where your body contacts the chair . . .”^[8] We can also listen to our posture (e.g., alert or slouched), breathing (e.g., rapid and shallow or slow and deep), and body position (e.g., direct or angled).^[9] All of these suggestions are ways to listen to the self (one’s presence) in preparation for listening to “others” (i.e., other people, nature, and the Divine). Sofer provides additional experiential instructions for cultivating presence, such as slowing down the pace of our “doing” and integrating short periods of “being” into our daily routine.^[10]

Empathic Heartfelt Connection

Heartfelt empathy is the starting point for the mediation process <footnote> Sometimes, conflicts between two parties are “mediated” by a third party (the mediator). The mediator organizes, structures, and facilitates communication between both parties, ideally ending with a mutually agreeable outcome. These conflicts can range from serious interpersonal disagreements, organizational labor-management disputes, legal battles, and wars between nation-states. [/footnote] according to nonviolent communication teacher Marshall Rosenberg.^[11] In Rosenberg’s decades of teaching nonviolent communication in classrooms, villages, boardrooms, and workshops, he found that seventy percent of the time, after a heartfelt connection is established between two individuals, a solution to the conflict is discovered within twenty minutes. In one workshop, Rosenberg demonstrates how to mediate heartfelt empathy to resolve an interpersonal disagreement between two individuals.^[12] He also recounts a story of applying the same process to resolving a dispute between two warring tribes in Africa (one Christian and one Muslim). The process is deceptively simple. The mediator (third party) invites one person in the conflict to express one of their needs and then invites the other person to demonstrate their understanding of the need by repeating the need back to the satisfaction of the first party, and vice versa. Once the needs are connected at the heart level (both parties demonstrate an understanding of the other’s needs), the solutions (strategies to meet the needs), in Rosenberg’s experience, are relatively easy to uncover quickly.^[13] The world needs mediators (like you) who listen empathically by facilitating heartfelt connections to manage and resolve conflicts.

Creating a Thinking Environment for Empathy

Another factor influencing empathic listening is the listening climate, which includes the quality of the other person’s attentive listening and the immediate environment. President of Time to Think, organizational consultant Nancy Kline claims “. . . the quality of a person’s attention determines the quality of other people’s thinking.”^[14] That means the listener needs to create a gentle, quiet, unrushed, non-competitive environment for the other person to think through their ideas. This is a challenge for those enculturated in modern industrialized countries. To facilitate a “thinking environment,” Kline recommends the listener adopt a relaxed posture, not interrupt the speaker, and allow the person to search for what they want to say in silence for as long as needed.^[15] When the listener thinks the speaker has completed their thoughts, they ask, “What else do you think about this?” and listen again with full attention. Kline’s book is replete with practical, experiential activities like this that challenge us to improve the quality of our empathic listening.

Aikido and Tai Chi as Embodied Empathy

Aikido and Tai Chi are sometimes associated with martial arts (originally, training for war). However, according to Aikido’s founder, Morihei Ueshiba, the spirit of Aikido is a peaceful art.^[16] Also, the flowing movements of Tai Chi, which can be accelerated to use for self-defense, suggest more about harmony and inner peace than direct combat.^[17] I describe how two techniques from these martial arts apply to embodied empathic listening. Specifically, I describe how Tai Chi’s “push hands” and Aikido’s “enter and blend” can be practiced as empathic listening to others.

English professor, Aikido student, and practitioner of contemplative pedagogy Barry Kroll developed an Arguing as an Art of Peace class.^[18] One of the student activities in the course is a sequence of Tai Chi movements called “push hands.”^[19] I present an abbreviated form of Kroll’s instructions here.

Another student activity that can be adapted to empathic listening is Kroll’s description of the Aikido sequence “enter and blend.”^[22]

The mutual understanding that results from embodied empathic listening is fertile ground for the beginning of dialogue and a mutually beneficial blending of viewpoints.

I trained weekly in Aikido as a novice white belt for just over two years. Embodying the flowing movements of entering an attack, blending, and reframing the energy so that no harm comes to either person is a thrilling and satisfying experience. When executed without effortful thinking, it feels magical. The flow of movements “just happens.” This spontaneous state of being in natural harmony with others and nature is sometimes referred to as Wu Wei.^[25] While there is much practice underneath the seemingly effortless flow of energy in these Aikido movements,^[26] no previous experience is required for students to begin embodying the experience of “entering and blending” with another person’s energy. The kinesthetic insight from this process can sometimes occur on the first attempt. Entering a conflict, embodying the other’s energy with empathy, and reframing the situation to encourage mutual understanding are vital to listening with deep empathy.