Kelly Barron

Mindfulness in schools, at work & everywhere

The Power of Listening

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What’s the difference between hearing and listening?

I once asked that question to a group of fourth-graders before leading them in a mindful listening practice.

“Hearing is like water falling and bouncing off a rock,” said one boy. “While listening is like water falling and being absorbed by a sponge.”

I’ve never forgotten how that wise fourth-grader responded to my question. It’s stayed with me as a metaphorical reminder of how to listen well – with interested, engaged, sponge-like attention.

It’s also stayed with me as a reminder of the subtle power of listening – both in conversation and as a meditation on the sounds around us.

Listening to Understand

Listening is a highly underrated skill. In conversation, we emphasize speaking but it’s through listening that we understand each other better.

People who listen well put others at ease, reduce social anxiety, promote more self-awareness and create more clarity, according to the Harvard Business Review.

Listening isn’t only valuable in conversation. Listening to the soundscape around us – whether it’s a Pharell William’s song or a car passing below our window – lands us in the present moment. Attending to sound is a dedicated form of meditation, offering us a focal point to develop concentration and connect to the vibrancy of our sensory world.

“The richness of life doesn’t lie in the loudness, the boom or the beat, but in the timbre, the variations and the subtle sounds that one can only discern when they pay attention,” says Scott Horowitz, an auditory neuroscientist.

Interesting things happen when we listen mindfully. Arguments transform into constructive conversations. Leaders learn from their employees, sparking more problem solving and innovation. And the “music” of our daily life becomes a source of joy and inspiration.

Listening as a Mindfulness Bell

Many years ago, I attended a poetry reading at the Los Angeles Times Book Fair. As the poet began to read his poem a baby in the audience started wailing. Embarrassed by the interruption, the mother got up to rush the infant outside of the open-air tent. But the poet stopped her and said: “Oh, please don’t take the baby away. A baby’s cry is like a tuning fork for a poet.”

There are many such tuning forks for us throughout the day – whether it’s listening attentively to your spouse or to a Blue Jay in your backyard.

Here are some perspectives and practices to make mindful listening a part of your daily life to help you enrich your relationships and become more present.

  • Listen to Understand: Author and educator Stephen Covey said: “The biggest communication problem we have is that we don’t listen to understand. We listen to reply.” If that sounds all too familiar your listening skills may need sharpening. Instead of plotting your next move, listen with the intention to understand the person who’s speaking. Nod your head and smile. Ask a question or two. You might be surprised how much more interesting the conversation becomes.
  • 80% on them; 20% on you: As Covey says much of the time when we think we’re listening, we’re actually formulating our reply or daydreaming, judging, etc. To quell these tendencies put 80% of your attention on the speaker and reserve 20% for yourself. Notice any mental, emotional, or physical reactions you might have to what’s being said. Notice when you’ve started to plan what you want to say or when you’ve checked out of the conversation entirely and started thinking about what you want to eat for lunch.
  • Open your ears: Often when we meditate we’re given the breath as an object of our focus. But the breath isn’t always a comfortable focal point for everyone. We also experience the world through more than just the felt sense of our breath. Next time you’re seated in meditation, shift your attention to listen to the sounds in your environment and use sound as a home base for your attention. You also can open your ears to everyday sounds to become more mindful in daily life. What do your footsteps sound like as you walk to the car? Can you hear the strike of the keys on your keyboard? How about the sound of your own breathing?
This blog originally appeared on eMindful.com

On My Mind

 

People are behaving badly in the almost post-pandemic world.

The Federal Aviation Administration reports that investigations into unruly passenger behavior on airplanes have tripled thus far in 2021 from the previous year. More than 3,500 passengers have been cited for everything from refusing to wear face masks to assaulting flight attendants. To keep crew members safe, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) recently resumed self-defense training for flight attendants, teaching techniques such as eye-poking and kicks to the groin to help de-escalate in-flight aggression. 

Colleges also are bracing for bouts of binge drinking and rowdy behavior as students return to campuses this fall with pent-up demand to return to normal university life.

And “cov rage” has replaced road rage as impatient, angry drivers return to roads.

Everyone’s nerves are frayed. Everyone’s exhausted. And when emotions run high, it’s difficult to rein in reactivity. Yet, restraint and responsiveness are skills worth cultivating in an ever-changing COVID-19 world.

One of the best mindfulness practices to help you shift from reactivity to responsiveness is STOP, which stands for Stop, Take a Breath, Observe and Proceed. Here’s how to practice STOP the next time you’re frustrated boarding an airplane, feeling overwhelmed at school, or fuming because you’re stuck in traffic:

  • Stop: Stop what you’re doing or what you’re about to do.
  • Take a Breath: Take a full breath. Connect with the inhalation and the exhalation, feeling your breath move down into your belly. Repeat as needed.
  • Observe: Notice what’s happening, inside you and around you. Are you bombarded with negative mental chatter? Is your jaw clenched? Do you feel a surge of anger rising into your chest? If you’re feeling too stirred up, it’s often helpful to turn your attention outward and notice the sights and sounds around you. Feel your feet on the ground.
  • Proceed. Once you feel settled give yourself the green light to move on and respond. And if you’re still reactive keep practicing STOP.

Why Curiosity Didn’t Kill The Cat

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Eleanor Roosevelt said that if she could ask a fairy godmother to give a child one gift at birth, it would be curiosity.

Most of us don’t think of curiosity as anything special. It’s like a backup singer to the Beyoncé of our bolder emotions. It’s in the background and easy to take for granted.


When we put a spotlight on curiosity, though, remarkable things happen.

We make profound scientific discoveries and innovations. Think of penicillin, iPhones, and Snickers Bars

We have more pleasant experiences and emotions.

Neuroimaging shows that when we’re curious, the dopamine pathways and reward centers of the brain activate.

Research also shows curiosity leads to greater happiness, empathy, social connection, and academic performance.

Being interested in our moment-to-moment experience can even quell anxiety.

“Of all of our human capacities, curiosity is at the top of my list of the most essential,” says Judson Brewer, a psychiatrist, neuroscientist, and author of “Unwinding Anxiety: New Science Shows How to Break the Cycles of Worry and Fear to Heal Your Mind.”

How Curiosity Quells Anxiety

Brewer says our capacity to become interested in our anxiety is one of the most effective ways of diminishing chronic cycles of worry and fear.

Instead of getting caught in anxiety-provoking rumination, Brewer counsels his readers to become curious about their direct experience of worry. Doing so not only interrupts habitual patterns, it also offers the brain a reward and widens our tolerance of anxious thoughts, emotions, and sensations. The more we can tolerate the discomfort of our anxiety the less we brace against and the readily it moves through us, bringing the spin-cycle of worry to a halt.

 Knowing the different flavors of curiosity

Brewer notes it’s important to distinguish between the urgent, need-to-know-now curiosity that often contributes to our anxiety and the wide-eyed wonder that soothes frayed nerves.

To stay open and interested, Brewer suggests repeating a simple mantra of “Hmmmmm” whenever worrisome thoughts and agitating sensations and emotions arise. I’ve found it helpful to add a rejoinder to Brewer’s refrain by saying: “Hmmmm. That’s interesting.” Doing so seems to beckon more wide-eyed wonder.

You also can use curiosity to guide your attention directly into the physical experience of anxiety, exploring the sensations that accompany it and further disentangling yourself from the mental whirl of worry that keeps us stuck.

Do the sensations of anxiety, for example, show up as tightness in your chest? If so, where do you feel the tightness the most- to the right, the center, or the left? (If moving attention directly into the physical sensations of worry is too much you can always shift your attention to neutral places in the body such as the hands or feet or even to the sounds around you.)

In many ways, curiosity is the essence of mindfulness. But even if you aren’t particularly mindful or don’t meditate, you can always follow your curiosity to lead you to new discoveries, more joy, and greater ease.

All of which makes me want to accept the gift of curiosity and let it take center stage.

 A version of this blog originally appeared on eMindful.com

On My Mind

Recently I wrote a post about “Rising Above Bias and Extending Kindness.” In the post, I mentioned how inclusivity is a practice. Whenever you begin to practice anything, you’re likely to make mistakes, and I made one. In my post, I used the phrase “confined to a wheelchair.”A very kind and wise friend pointed out to me that: “Many in the disabled community object to this term. They see a wheelchair as a tool for mobility, freedom, not as a place of confinement. Confinement also is regarded as having a negative connotation of requiring containment for the person with a disability, furthering the notion they are “the other.”

I’m so grateful my friend took that time to share this with me. I’m the better for it, and I hope you are too.

To learn more about “ableism,” or discrimination against people with disabilities or those who are perceived to be disabled check out this helpful link: https://www.accessliving.org/newsroom/blog/ableism-101/

Extending Kindness to Everyone

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Not far from my house is a public playground called Aidan’s Place that’s as big of a draw for kids as an ice cream truck on a hot summer day.

Slides, swings, climbing structures, and an enormous shaded sandpit bring families from all economic and racial backgrounds, creating a melting pot of play and joy.

But what makes Aidan’s Place unique isn’t diversity – it’s inclusivity. Inspired by a boy named Aidan who had a rare muscular disorder that left him confined to a wheelchair, all of the playground’s equipment is universally accessible and inclusive.

Inclusivity has been on my mind lately as we celebrate PRIDE month – a time when millions of people around the world gather to uplift and support the LGBTQ community – and because of Juneteenth which commemorates the end of slavery in the United States.

Both PRIDE month and Juneteenth are deeply rooted in history.

PRIDE month occurs in June because of the Stonewall uprising in June 1969 in New York City when police raided a gay bar, sparking riots and giving rise to a modern-day gay rights movement.

Juneteenth – short for June 19th – is the day in 1865 when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas to ensure freedom for all enslaved individuals. Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation two and a half years earlier, but it didn’t immediately mean freedom for many Blacks as it applied only to Confederate-controlled areas.

Re-evaluating Inclusivity

While the pandemic has curtailed some of the parades, celebrations, and symposiums, the month of June still gives us the opportunity to honor LGBTQ and Black communities. It also gives us a chance to learn more about diversity and equity and to ask ourselves: Are we inclusive?

“Diversity is being invited to the party; inclusivity is being asked to dance,” says Verna Myers, whose consultancy teaches organizations about issues such as unconscious bias and anti-racism.

Inclusivity isn’t just about recognizing each other’s differences; it’s about being empathetic, participatory and dignifying, and respecting everyone.

Many of us may not be aware of the biases – subtle or otherwise – we have toward others. We also may not have put ourselves in the shoes of those who have been discriminated against and marginalized.

In both cases, mindfulness can help us investigate our limiting beliefs and open our hearts to others.

Rising Above Personal Biases Through Mindfulness

 

Like a coin with two sides – one that supports insight and the other compassion – we can use our mindfulness practice to see more clearly how we exclude rather than include and notice the moments when our hearts close instead of open.

In our daily lives, we can observe the thoughts, emotions, and sensations that arise when interacting with others and notice how they affect our behavior. Do we reserve eye contact or a smile for those who are most like us? Do we treat everyone we meet the same?

Just like mindfulness, inclusivity is a practice – one we can undertake with a willingness to see and rise above our biases and extend kindness to everyone.

If you’d like to learn more about PRIDE Month and Juneteenth, check out the links in this blog. You also can open your heart to others and foster more inclusivity through the following mindfulness exercise, based on meditation teacher Mirabai Bush’s Just Like Me practice:

  • Find a quiet and comfortable place to sit and bring to mind someone you casually know or come across in your daily life – the cashier at the grocery store, the Amazon delivery person, or a neighbor you pass on the street.
  • With this person in mind, repeat the following phrases:
  •  Just like me, this person has a body and mind filled with thoughts, feelings, and emotions
  •  Just like me, this person has experienced physical, mental, and emotional pain.
  •  Just like me, this person has been afraid, disappointed, or lonely.
  •  Just like me, this person wants to be safe and healthy.
  •  Just like me, this person wishes to be happy. They want to be loved.
  •   Now, continue the practice by bringing to mind someone who is different from you and repeating the same phrases.
This blog originally appeared on eMindful.com

Forgiveness as a Daily Practice

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Grudges don’t have to be big to be burdensome.

Even small, unforgiven slights can weigh us down like an overpacked carry-on.

Think about the time your spouse snored relentlessly through the night, wrecking your sleep before a big presentation, or about the sibling who missed your birthday. How about the mechanic who found one too many things wrong with your car after you’d left it at the shop?

Still chafing? Still stoking embers of resentment?

If so, it might be time to forgive – and if not forget – at least let go.

What it Really Means to Forgive

For years, I thought forgiveness was for life’s big emotional blows.

I read stories about mothers who softened their hearts toward drunk drivers who maimed or killed their children. I read about Nelson Mandela’s immense act of forgiveness toward his imprisoners. I read lofty quotes about forgiveness, and I wondered: Could I ever live up to such vaulted ideals?

Then, it occurred to me that forgiveness isn’t like a set of fine china. It’s like an everyday coffee cup –serviceable and reliably handy.

“Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it’s a constant attitude,” said Martin Luther King Jr.

King’s quote is inspiring. It’s also practical. It prompts us to bring mindfulness into everyday moments of hurt and consider whether we can forgive others as well as ourselves.

Doing so is nuanced practice. Forgiveness is both a decision and an emotional process.

The Benefits of Forgiveness

Nonetheless, we can decide how to treat those we feel wronged us by not acting out, withdrawing, or seeking payback. We also can become aware of our emotional reactions whenever we’re wounded and work to transform our anger into compassion and empathy.

Of course, none of this is easy. Research says that despite the benefits of forgiveness, which include everything from lowering heart attack risk to reducing anxiety and anger, many people struggle to put forgiveness into practice.

Sometimes grudges against others are difficult to dislodge. Forgiving yourself is nettlesome, too.

Forgiving Yourself and Forgiving Others

Meditation teacher JoAnna Hardy has said she once practiced self-forgiveness for a year, silently repeating the phrase – “May I forgive myself” – before getting out of bed in the morning.

Her model of forgiveness practice has stayed with me for years, helping me soften my self-criticism. As for others, I’ve adopted the coffee-cup approach, taking forgiveness down from the shelf and using it in daily life (See Below) with friends who snub me by not returning phone calls or texts and drivers who cut me off in traffic.

Forgiveness also has been a salve for long-lasting hurts too painful to name.

If you’d like to forgive and let go the following framework based on psychologist Everett Worthington’s REACH model is a wonderful way to put forgiveness into practice.

  • Recall: Recall the hurt. Acknowledge the injury without treating yourself like a victim or the other person like a jerk.
  • Empathize: Put yourself in the other person’s shoes.
  • Altruistic gift: Consider forgiveness a charitable gift even if the offender doesn’t seem worthy.
  • Commit: Commit to the act of forgiving, repeating a phrase such as: “I forgive them” or “I forgive myself.”
  • Hold onto forgiveness: Forgiveness is a process and a practice. Silently repeating the above phrases during seated meditation or lying in bed before your day begins keeps forgiveness in your heart.

This blog originally appeared on eMindful.com

On My Mind

 

Many people come to meditation to settle their busy minds and find an island of calm within the storm of their anxiety.

But meditation doesn’t fix a busy mind. It doesn’t get rid of anxiety. It does something more profound.

Practicing meditation changes our relationship with our addled minds and frayed nerves. It teaches us to no longer view them as problems to solve but experiences – unpleasant or otherwise – that come and go and that we can tolerate if not embrace.

Author Marc Hamer relays this far more lyrically in his lovely book: Seed to Dust, Life, Nature, And a Country Garden. Hamer writes:

“Developing a calm mind is like building a relationship with a cat. If you try to make it come to you, it will run further away; if you chase after it, it will hide; but if you sit quietly, keep an eye on it and appear ready, it will come to you, and it may stay or it may go, but a relationship will have been created and a stronger one is more likely, the more you sit and practice.” 

Begin Again: Three Ways Spring Can Help Us Renew and Recharge

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The other day I looked out my home office window and spied a single, pink poppy turning its luminous head toward the sun.

“Where did you come from?” I murmured to myself.

I had forgotten that during a rainy period last December, I pressed poppy seeds into the soft soil in my backyard. It was an act of faith amid a winter made all the more dreary by the pandemic. And it was gratifying to see Mother Nature hadn’t let me down.

Spring is eternal and, yet, we take its life-affirming arrival for granted. It’s easy to miss the changing of the seasonal guards – that subtle period when the effervescence of springtime bubbles up and the plodding gray of winter recedes.

Like the first steps in a celebratory parade, a few timid blossoms appear and then become a celebration of color in the garden. Before long, the sun is shining more often than not, and we’ve traded in our wool socks for flip-flops.

It’s worth paying attention to the start of spring’s procession and reveling in its arrival – full of growth, possibility, and hope.

“Spring will come, and so will happiness,” wrote author Anita Krizan. “Hold on. Life will get warmer.”

While there’s no guarantee the circumstances of our lives will change favorably along with the weather, we can use the momentum of the season to renew ourselves and recharge.

We can look back, without self-recrimination or shame, and reflect on whether we’ve kept the promises we made to ourselves and others in the New Year.

Have we shed our dreaded COVID 15 pounds? Have we quit smoking like we told our kids we would? Maybe we made a quiet vow to be kinder to ourselves and others, but have lapsed quite humanly into irritability. Maybe we just need to pause and forgive ourselves for our failings, acknowledging that some habits, like seeds planted in a backyard, need time to take root.

Whatever intention we set at the start of the year, springtime allows us to renew our commitment, change course or look ahead to where we might now want to go. Spring beckons us to throw open the windows and let in a fresh breeze of perspective. It beckons us to begin again.

Meditation practice gives us an experiential base from which to do so. Every time our mind wanders from our chosen object of focus – the breath, sounds around us, or a softly repeated phrase – we gently reclaim our focus and begin anew.

With the lift of spring in our step, we also can do so in our daily lives and give shape to whatever our hearts may still need or want for the rest of the year. Here are three ways you can use the elevating energy of springtime and your mindfulness practice to renew and recharge:

Lighten Up: Wintertime is serious business. It’s about hunkering down and laying low. But springtime is as playful as a puppy. The comedian Robin Williams once quipped that spring is nature’s way of saying: “Let’s party!” And the warmer weather and brighter days invite us to lighten up – if only for a few moments or an afternoon. We can invite a bit of inner springtime by adopting a more playful or curious attitude toward ourselves, our lives, and even the things that challenge us. Next time you feel heavy-hearted, look out the window for signs of spring and remember that everything is always changing. You might also want to plan a party.

Take it In: Springtime is bursting with a sensory bouquet of sounds, sights, and smells. All of which can fill us with joy and hope. When you head outdoors for a walk, turn it into a mindfulness practice and notice the lilting tune of birdsong, the Crayola box of colors surrounding you, or the fresh scent of your neighbor’s just-cut lawn. As you do so, pay attention to any accompanying feelings or sensations arising within you. The gentle warmth you feel upwelling in your chest, throat, or face might be happiness. And if it is, it’s worth soaking it in like a bluebird sipping water from a fountain.

Begin Again: We can use springtime as a seasonal reference point to start anew with anything we’ve attempted but faltered with or forgotten. There’s a prevailing myth that progress is constant and ascending. In truth, progress happens in fits and starts. Like roots supporting a plant, progress often quietly grows beneath the surface of our lives – it’s evidence emerging with time. Spring gives us yet another opportunity to plant a new seed of intention and patiently wait for what might grow from our renewed efforts.