The simple act of listening can change a life; not just hearing another person, but actually listening; there is a profound difference, and therein lies a mystery. To be concrete, true listening changes two lives — the person speaking, and the person receiving. The even bigger picture: listening is a creative act that allows the birth of a new possibility in us and in the ecology we generate together.
Is listening really that powerful? That’s what we explore in this conversation with Aviv Shahar and a group of Portals friends who have been on a discovery journey into the realms of listening, some for several years.
What do we mean by listening, not just hearing? Listening is an intentional, active process that engages our many inner lives — brain, mind and heart — not just our ears. Listening needs us to create a space free of judgment and bias, which means a place of nourishing support for both the speaker and receiver.
Feeling safe and received allows any one of us to feel at home and true to ourselves, maybe for the first time. Such a unique and natural exchange also creates an ecology where new perceptions and healing can emerge to transform and elevate both. Other insights into the realm of listening include:
- Part of being a listening “midwife” comes from a curiosity about what’s trying to be born.
- Listening is healing, and a way of becoming listening priests; we give permission and space for others to birth themselves in us, inside the presence of our listening.
- Most people have never experienced truly being listened to; when they do, it's transformative. For the first time ever, they can come home — home inside. We’re saying by our presence they’re important.
- There is a mystical side to listening; the presence and place of silence, of inner peace and quiet. Inner silence is an important ingredient in making oneself a better and deeper listener.
- In difficult conversations people may disagree too early, before understanding each other's positions, ideas and values. The inner work of listening is to give understanding the space and time it needs.
This conversation is part of the continuing Portals discovery into what is emerging on the frontiers of human experience in this time of profound change. Information about upcoming special events can be found on the Events page. Also visit and subscribe to our YouTube channel.
When we listen deeply to another person, we actually help them regather themselves and reintegrate the fragments they left all around. It's as though we are telling that other person ‘you are important’. So much of modern life is the chase of ‘I must be missing something; I must be somewhere else; I must be doing something else’. All of a sudden, we bring the entire focus of listening to them.
Aviv Shahar
Aviv serves as the Portals' sherpa. He curates transformational journeys and is a storyteller of the epochal evolution culminating at this time. Aviv is the Founder of Aviv Consulting, helping leaders unleash strategic innovation, and is the author of Create New Futures: How Leaders Produce Breakthroughs and Transform the World Through Conversation.
Visit: Aviv Consulting
