Learning to Listen
Understanding ourselves sounds simple. How can we not understand ourselves? We are living our lives all the time and feeling what we like and don’t like. Right?
How can you tell if you aren’t listening to yourself?
We are people pleasing - if our actions are to please others then we are not listening to ourselves. We are listening to the desires and wants of someone else and doing what they would want.
We are honest with who we are - if for some reason we are not being honest with who we are then we are trying to be something we aren’t
We feel like we are living someone else’s life - if you aren’t listening to your own guidance system them you will not be stepping into shoes, your own life.
We don’t take time and stop to listen - life is so busy now a days, we go from one activity to the next and don’t stop. One of the best ways to listen to yourself is to take time to listen.
We don’t pay attention to how we feel - our minds race a million miles a minute. If we want to listen to ourselves we have to stop our brains from thinking and feel. Listening to ourselves isn’t usually about listening to our brains its about listening to our bodies and our feelings.
We don’t give ourselves new experiences - for us to listen to ourselves we need to try new things so we can see how we feel about them. Trying new things can feel scary and out our comfort zone. But after we try something it gives ourselves room to evaluate and listen to ourselves and see how we felt about this experience.
Now lets have a simple experience of trying a dragon fruit or a fruit you have never tried and go through the list.
Try a dragon fruit or another fruit you have never eaten, really try it. Not because someone else has told you to eat the fruit but you want to see if you like it our not. You aren’t eating it because you have to, you have the option not to. You are eating for just you. Now really taste it. Do you like it? Do you dislike it? Do you like the texture? Does the texture feel funny in your mouth? Does it taste like something you have tried before?
Be honest. You don’t have to like the fruit because it is healthy or because you don’t want to waste it. You can dislike the fruit or like the fruit. What does your body say?
Live in your body and listen to your body. Eat the fruit mindfully and be totally aware of eating the fruit.
How does it feel to take time to listen to yourself?
How does it feel to think about what you are doing in the present moment? So many times we eat without even tasting the food we are eating.
How does it feel to try something new?
That was an example of listening to yourself. It starts with the little things. What food do we like or don’t like, what kind of activities do we like and don’t like. Next it is about learning and developing skills and figure out what ones work best for us or don’t work well. The list goes on. Learning to listen to ourself is a life long process. That is why we developed the Pasiter, to help the learning process start young. Plus the learning is shaped by ourselves and no one else.