Listening

 "You see pain with your eyes, but you sympathize with your ears. Sometimes the greatest way to serve someone is just by listening. Behind every need is a story"  Rick Warren

I could hear singing coming from Maya's room a few moments after hearing her doing her nightly goodnight to the caricature of her favorite Educational Assistant and friend on the wall as she lay in her bed.   As I was brushing my teeth, the song she was singing registered as a result of a familiar chorus," Que sera sera",  lyrics that she has used many times before in a patterned script as her neurodiverse self often does when she really likes a song, dialogue or is working through a feeling or thought that fits with the words.  No sooner had the lyric clicked for me, than she was asking me to join in a duet and so we sang, "When I was just a little girl, I asked my mother what will I be? Will I be pretty? Will I be rich? Here's was she said to me, Que sera, sera, whatever will be will be, the future's not ours to see, Que sera sera." I stayed in the bathroom as we sang, and the lyrics seemed to split easefully between us as I did one part and when I paused she finished the line.  She was giggling throughout and then when her part started to fade, I stopped singing.  I thought I had been listening to her, engaging as she had asked and I  felt good about the moment we shared but it wasn't until she was asleep that I really heard her and what she was actually saying to me if I was really listening.

The Kindergarten year begins in a few short days and as I sifted through what to take with me from years past, things that worked or saw success and things I would leave behind because they either don't make sense anymore or they are tired and don't fit with new philosophies or my own growth as an educator, I was thinking about the concept of whole body listening.   This has been a staple that I have modeled and mentored for many years.  Listening with not only our ears but all of our bodies and senses.  Talking to them about what a listener might look or sound like.  We practice little moments of listening as moving, playing, and socializing are the majority of the skills most needed for our tasks but in those moments of practice, listening gains more collateral with them. They start to see how it makes them feel when someone is whole body listening as they share their show and tell when they offer news about their weekend or their night at home, what made them sad, or happy, or their problem on the playground,  or at the coat rack. When they were proud of the items in their lunch box or just needed to request a hug or a band-aid for their bug bite.  Some even begin to feel empowered to point out when they don't feel someone in the group is listening and they tell them to put their eyes on them or they may say they will wait until one of their classmates stops talking before they share. 

I feel like I have been working on my own listening skills over many years, clearing my own thoughts, and opening my heart and my mind over and over again. Listening to others to learn from them on podcasts and other platforms, asking difficult questions, and listening to heartfelt responses,  and somehow it makes sense that I will be continuing to do so as long as I am a living breathing social being.   Listening is such a complex skill that we all need and yet only we know if we are really able to hear what is being communicated to us.  Sometimes the message is the words spoken, sometimes the message lies behind the words. Sometimes we listen to a message that is difficult to hear but has something to teach us about ourselves. Maybe just in our reaction to the message.  Other times the words are sending a message we need to hear but are not ready for just yet. We often listen to respond to others.  Sometimes the message we need to hear is our own.  We need to listen to our bodies and our hearts.  This kind of listening may help us with an underlying message.  If our bodies are sick, we may need to hear that we are too stressed, or the food we are eating is not nourishing us.  If our hearts are heavy, we may need to hear the grief we have been ignoring or the anger that is lingering from unresolved conflict.    In most cases, listening is beyond the words or phrases being said by others or ourselves.

In the past weeks, I have noticed myself wanting to be listened to. I have wanted to share ideas and solutions I have to recent difficulties and see if they resonate or make sense. I have wanted to voice my concern for injustices and ways others are being excluded or need to be included.  I have wanted to suggest a different way forward or ask for help in realizing a solution to a bigger problem. All of these things related to my own personal life and experiences but realizing for this to happen I needed to risk not being heard and maybe just being alright with formulating and hearing aloud my own needs as words being strung together, spoken or written.  With some, I have chosen carefully what to say and the wording for clarity. With others, I have shared and bared it all with lots of emotion and urgency. And still more, I was calculating what to write or say and who I hoped would hear my message. I can say that with the responses I received I felt very heard.  One dear friend sat across the table from me and didn't move a muscle in her body. Her eyes were on me the entire time and she didn't try to interject or relate to what I was telling her. She was just open-hearted and listened.  Another, humbled me with the time, care, and respect she formulated with her written response to my long convoluted email. Her words were like butter dripping over popcorn and soaking me in the buttery goodness of her sweet soul's intention to make me feel heard and understood.  Another, was very direct and inquisitive, from a person in a position to make a  difference, and a meeting was arranged to talk about needs, solutions, and desires to clarify how they could help.  And still, another, allowed me to essentially rant across the phone lines and then thanked me for offering her insight into the situation I painted with my big brush.   It made me curious as to what I was afraid of in relation to asking for help in the ways I was needing.  Many of us are those do-it-yourselfers who see asking to be heard or listened to as saying I can't do it alone and this makes me flawed somehow and maybe this is not the message we want others to hear.  I can say from repeated experience,  that what others actually hear, is your willingness to ask for what you need,  you valuing what you have to say enough to not to be inhibited by how others may receive your words, and in this, they see you as one of the people brave enough to communicate the core of you, your truth and they will not only listen to you but will offer you the privilege of this same connection by asking you to listen and hear them as well.

Maya inviting me to sing the lyrics of "Que sera sera" a few nights ago was not random.  She had been witnessing and listening to my words, my body language, and my silence that day.  After she fell asleep that night, what I finally heard her saying in those lyrics meant for me, between and beyond them was this, "Mom, it's ok. You don't need to have this all figured out today, tonight, or ever.  We can't see the future, we can't control it, but we can accept that, "whatever will be will be".   

I am reminding myself to listen with the same passion with which I wish to be heard, in the words of Harriet Learner and as I start a new day tomorrow before I lift my head from my pillow, I will place my hands on my head, then my heart and my core and I will listen with compassion for what is meant to be heard and with this same compassion and patience, I will prepare to be open to hearing all that is being said by those around me and then this time, as my husband walks up the driveway after parking the car and Maya stands by the window watching and singing, "Here comes the sun, doo, doo, doo Here comes the sun and I say it's alright doo, doo doo. I will have the pleasure to hear the first time round, Dad is home, my sunshine, and my light and that makes everything alright" and I will smile to myself and to her and we will share in the joy of listening and being heard.