A Life-Changing Insight Into Listening

[UnbornTao]

@Eskilon I had finished writing a long response but ended up deleting it. This is just too superficial and inefficient. It would require a course or a seminar. Just be grounded. Enjoy.

 

[EmiHyen]

Love the exercise  I’ve been thinking about it a lot these past few days and playing around with concepts. Here are my insights:

It’s interesting to think that listening go beyond sound and becomes the attention to what appears in awareness. You can listen not only to sound, but also to your body, your thoughts, and many other things that appear there. When you start drawing connections between what appears and your experience, understanding begins.

Not listening is just hearing. But a sudden loud noise can still make your body react, which shows that the body also listens in its own way. It "understands" that something is happening before the mind turns it into a narration.

When listening becomes understanding, it becomes, in the end, a narration. That narration can be corrupted by bias, or it can stay connected to Truth. It stays connected to Truth when it remains grounded in what is real and open through not-knowing.

The person speaking and the one listening are both constructing narrations, so both can be biased.

Listening well means slowing down your assumptions, because the faster you fill the gaps with your own biases, the less accurate and truthful your understanding becomes.

People also reconstruct their own experience while speaking, so do not take everything they say as the full truth. Listening well means staying curious and skeptical enough to let a clearer truth emerge.

[UnbornTao]

@EmiHyen Welcome.

[UnbornTao]

[UnbornTao]

Learn to discern hoopla from a communication. The following is an extremely obvious case of the former. Also, it's just funny as hell:

 

[Joseph Maynor]

Have you noticed that someone may not even want to listen?  You may be giving what you think is a great and constructive insight on a situation or relation and someone may not listen, or even if they do, they never register or agree with you about it.  And the issue comes up over and over again.   You're made to feel silly for even bringing it up.  This is what you have to notice.  Understand it structurally and systemically so it doesn't become too personal. 

[UnbornTao]

On 3/6/2026 at 8:03 PM, Joseph Maynor said:

Have you noticed that someone may not even want to listen?  You may be giving what you think is a great and constructive insight on a situation or relation and someone may not listen, or even if they do, they never register or agree with you about it.  And the issue comes up over and over again.   You're made to feel silly for even bringing it up.  This is what you have to notice.  Understand it structurally and systemically so it doesn't become too personal. 

Oh yeah. Like K said, to truly listen to someone isn't very common. 

What would you say listening to another, in that case, would require? What would the other "do" beyond the ritual (nodding, hearing, paying attention) of having heard what you had to say? What would that process leave them with? For example, an idea?

What would make you say, "Oh yeah, you listened"?

This can be hard to see. Sometimes it seems someone may have listened because they agree with you or share the same view or conclusion, or can express themselves with similar terminology as yours. Not necessarily. After the process: What's their experience?

And this very process is happening to us as we speak, and yet we think it doesn't apply to us.

Edited March 8 by UnbornTao

[Joseph Maynor]

4 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

Oh yeah. Like K said, to truly listen to someone is very rare.

What would you say listening to another, in that case, would require? What would the other "do" beyond the ritual (nodding, hearing, paying attention) of having heard what you had to say? What would that process leave them with? For example, an idea?

What would make you say, "Oh yeah, you listened"?

This can be hard to see. Sometimes it seems someone may have listened because they agree with you or share the same view or conclusion, or can express themselves with similar terminology as yours. Not necessarily. After the process: What's their experience?

And this very process is happening to us as we speak, and yet we think it doesn't apply to us.

Interesting.  Well, we're talking about two things combined.  One, did the person understand you.  Two, are they interested in meeting you half way.  1. is cognitive, 2. is emotional and relational.  

[zurew]

4 hours ago, Eskilon said:

Even though the "cult leader" has said repeatedly to no trust him(or anyone for that matter), to always question things to death. I don't know but this doesn't sound like a cult lol.

Saying to question things to death is completely empty, when there is either no satisfying answer is given when one is challenged or the question is just simply dodged. If we were to go through statistically what kind of responses Leo gives when his fundamental claims are challenged , then my guess would be that 90%+ of those responses involves saying things like  "I am the most awake person and you dont understand what I understand and I wont bend over backwards to respond to your pathetic misunderstandings and your closed-mindedness"

 

You mistake the empty saying of "question things, and verify things for yourself", with not being dogmatic, but uttering that statement is compatible with him and actualized.org being dogmatic. If it were the case that Leo wouldn't be dogmatic, then he wouldnt navigate fundamental disagreements the way he does.  Namely, he wouldn't automatically just assume (in literally all cases) that his interlocutor is wrong and that his interlocutor is the one who needs to do more verification and more work and more thinking and more spiritual work, but he would be open to the possibility that he fucked up and he is fundamentally wrong.

 

The other thing that shows cultishness, is that no suckup mods and no hardcore Leo followers would even assign 10%  credibility to alien awakening and such claims, if they would be introduced by someone other than Leo. The issue is not that his hardcore followers are open to the possibility that such an awakening is possible , it is that given the fact that Leo introduced it to be the case,  there is no state of affairs where they would start to entertain the possibility that such a thing is false or implausible and that Leo is fundamentally wrong.

Like what divine state of affairs would need to happen, so that they will say something like "Even though I cant be 100% certain on this, I still take Leo's claim about alien awakening to be incredibly implausible and I think he is fundamentally wrong" rather than forever repeating the cultish  "I need to do more spiritual work to realize what Leo realized" and then never lowering their credence in his claim (not even by 0.00001%).

 

 

We also know that no Leo suckup here would ever accept the Leo disagreement protocol used by someone who isnt Leo. Like imagine having multiple drug trips that goes against one of the fundamental claims of Leo and then telling to Leo and to his suckups (after recognizing that there is a fundamental disagreement) that "Well ,well ,well, you guys need to verify what I said for yourselves and you guys need to question things deeper".

Do you think the response there from Leo and from his suckups would be "Yeah, I need to rethink the insights from my trips because there is an epistemic issue here that I need to resolve" or it would be "that guy is 100% wrong, he is the one who needs to do more verifying and more questioning, what a pathetic freak, this guy thinks he understands reality better than Leo lol".

Which response is more plausible in that a situation? The answer to that question tells you how cultish his suckups are and how dogmatic Leo is.

 

My question for you would be - what behavior you can point to that is done by Leo and by his suckups that showes that they dont use platitudes like "verify it for yourself" and "be more open minded" mainly as a defense mechanism to forever delay changing their own views on things (when they are fundamentally challenged).

Edited March 6 by zurew

[UnbornTao]

2 hours ago, Joseph Maynor said:

Interesting.  Well, we're talking about two things combined.  One, did the person understand you.  Two, are they interested in meeting you half way.  1. is cognitive, 2. is emotional and relational.  

If you hand me a ball called "my experience" and I catch it, then in that connection we might say that, metaphorically speaking, listening took place. Not the best metaphor. We see that this has to occur outside of, or independent of, my intellect and view. This action of mine would have to be entirely about you.

If you think about it, you can't escape being relational. And being emotional oneself obstructs listening. It isn't really needed at all. One's reactions would be irrelevant here.

Jargon, giving instructions, providing information, sharing the contents of your mind - these are not the same as the act of communicating.

I feel that the depth of this simple act is hard to convey and develop for everyone.

Just consider that it is possible for two people to create the same experience as a result of this process. Magic!

And then what you do with it is up to you. Maybe you see it as a delusion, a fascinating idea, an intriguing notion, a profound insight, a manipulation, a joke, nonsense, or a feeling of sadness.

Edited March 6 by UnbornTao

[Joseph Maynor]

48 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

If you hand me a ball called "your experience" and I catch it, then in that connection we might say that, metaphorically speaking, listening took place. Not the best metaphor. We see that this has to occur outside of, or independent of, my intellect and view. This action of mine would have to be entirely about you.

If you think about it, you can't escape being relational. And being emotional oneself obstructs that process. It isn't really needed at all. One's reactions would be irrelevant here.

Jargon, giving instructions, providing information, sharing the contents of your mind - these are not the same as the act of communicating.

I feel that the depth of this simple act is hard to convey and develop for everyone.

Just consider that it is possible for two people to create the same experience as a result of this process. Magic!

And then what you do with it is up to you. Maybe you see it as a delusion, a fascinating idea, an intriguing notion, a profound insight, a manipulation, a joke, nonsense, or a feeling of sadness.

Notice I had to catch your ball of "experience" here too, thank you.  It's a good metaphor.  Yes we can't escape being relational, I agree.  Emotions I don't think obstruct anything per se, although they definitely can.  Emotions also draw us toward Relation which is Love.  I'm curious as to what you think a proper act of communicating is.

[UnbornTao]

@zurew Always refreshing to read you.

[UnbornTao]

46 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

Notice I had to catch your ball of "experience" here too, thank you.  It's a good metaphor.  Yes we can't escape being relational, I agree.  Emotions I don't think obstruct anything per se, although they definitely can.  Emotions also draw us toward Relation which is Love.  I'm curious as to what you think a proper act of communicating is.

I think I lost you there. It's more like this: with your emotions involved, you'd still be focused on your own world and viewpoint, not the other person's. In that sense, it's an obstacle here. Listening is not about you.

Communication is getting your experience across - and someone else receiving it as it is. That's all. Simple enough on paper. But when it comes to profound insights, it can take years or even decades to learn how to listen.

One thing you realize the more you look into this is that it doesn't seem to be a common occurrence. We often don't even realize when we aren't listening, despite going through the ritual, gestures, and so on.

[Natasha Tori Maru]

11 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

I think I lost you there. It's more like this: with your emotions involved, you'd still be focused on your own world and viewpoint, not the other person's. In that sense, it's an obstacle here. Listening is not about you.

Do you think you can listen and not involve emotions? 

[Eskilon]

@zurew Leo is definetly far from perfect and he certaintly has flaws. He can be arrogant and narcissistic. The topic below shows his flaws and that he might be high on his own farts too. I think he gives too much authority to psychedelics and he bashs eastern traditions without doing the insane work the old masters did like for example Buddha who meditated for 6 years before enlightenment and Mahavira who did it for 12 years, Leo didnt even come close to those numbers and yet talk like buddhism and stuff is bullshit. He is flawed and I would not say to anyone to trust his word on existencial matters lol. And he does sometimes appear close-minded, ironically. But he says good things too, you know, I don't really think he is a cult leader. Even if he comes someday and say all the things he said about God is false and delusion that too would be fine because he always said from the start to not believe him.

 

Edited March 7 by Eskilon

[UnbornTao]

16 minutes ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

Do you think you can listen and not involve emotions? 

Of course. I'm not sure how to explain why I feel certain about this. Emotions themselves are manipulations and can be uncreated, difficult as that may be.

Imagine someone is conveying an experience with no emotions - now that's a contemplation.

Feelings are a different matter. You need to be sensitive (receptive) to them.

Edited March 6 by UnbornTao

[Joseph Maynor]

35 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

Emotions themselves are manipulations and can be uncreated, difficult as that may be.

?

[UnbornTao]

8 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

?

You create them to move you into action, essentially.

Everything you do is a manipulation. Scratching an itch, for example. Anyway, this requires another thread.

[Joseph Maynor]

7 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

You create them to move you into action, essentially.

Everything you do is a manipulation. Scratching an itch, for example. Anyway, this requires another thread.

Start the thread.

[UnbornTao]

51 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

Start the thread.

I gave you the short version. Every effect created to affect a condition is a manipulation. And this isn't bad per se, or the same as the socially covert and self-interested, indirect or sneaky manipulation that's seen negatively. It just comprises everything you think and do. Look up the original etymology of the word.

You can start it yourself, if you want.

Edited March 7 by UnbornTao