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Receptivity

Are you on transmit all the time? Eager to make your point, say the next thing, or make a statement? Our culture encourages this, so I’m sure we have all done it.

It’s as if we are trained to think that only breathing in is good. What could be wrong with more air?

If we are constantly transmitting or pushing our own agenda (especially what we think other people want), we aren’t leaving space to hear what they are saying.

There’s more to being receptive, though. You can consider yourself to be in dialogue with the world around you, creating events and realities at the point of interaction. Then everything that happens is part of that dialogue, and you can listen for what the world is telling you.

You don’t have to believe in a conscious universe, intelligent design, or other concepts that may strike you as woo-woo for this to be powerfully useful, even essential.

Adopting the idea that the world is communicating with you personally and teaching you things puts you in a receptive frame of mind and implicitly assumes that you can learn something of value from whatever happens.

It also helps you consider more deeply which actions may have prompted which responses. Of course, like any conversation, the world has its own story to tell, and what happens may have nothing to do with anything you’ve said or done. There may be even more of value to learn in that case.

Spend some time being quiet and listening, and you may make discoveries of enormous value.