Independence. The word itself connotes so many variations of self-sufficiency, autonomy, and in some way, mindfulness for the moment. It has become fairly easy for people to get influenced by others owing to their thinking patterns and ideologies of life. Given the amount of information an average information reads and absorbs mostly talk about ‘them’ and not ‘us’.
And top it off, being a woman is a kind of adventure in itself while practicing being independent in our own lifestyle. The pressure of listening to others, because we have been conditioned to do so, makes us feel we are being our own self when giving a listening ear to someone else’s point of view. This to a large extent is fair and warranted in some cases – but the truth is: if listening is all about others, where is your perspective? Who should listen to you?
Now the obvious answer to surmise is: of course, others will listen to you. But the truth of the matter is: you are your best listener. And when you start to acknowledge your own thoughts, their genesis, the rationale, you will suddenly feel independent – as the word suggests. You will be conscientious and more self-aware of yourself and eventually others. You will connect the dots that you initially thought were not there, but via being in kinship with your thoughts and yourself, you do read between the lines.
Today, even though, most of us a working and taking home a good paycheck, we still don’t find the word independence kicking in. Why? Because, no matter how much thick skinned we consider ourselves to be, still waters run deep – i.e. we are susceptible to perceptions, things, relationships, and people in general.
And once susceptible, listening to others doesn’t always quench our curiosity quotient of defining happiness when listening to others. A lot of us gnaw our own voice – thinking our own voices need to be embellished with some different tangent or an angle to it, to make it sound ‘listenable’ to our ears. In fact voices attract voices in their emotion, then why should you constrict yourself? We all are in some way emotionally connected to a bigger universe – then how can you ignore your own expression?
So what is the best way to be a natural listener and not when we are forced or propelled by circumstances to make a living out of listening to others while not extenuating our own voice?
Connect with yourself every 10-20 minutes a day and listen to your deepest insecurities, apprehensions, longings, or an aching pain; you will start to find missing patters in your thoughts that need a sync or a connect. Then move on to listen to others and find the same missing link – this could be their happy moments but still somewhere you will trace a void – and start to connect the two missing links via listening and understanding their situation.
Gradually when you become wary of your thinking pattern, your independence will make you positively vulnerable and move you instead of being affected with negative thinking and dullness in connecting with others.
Over a period of time, you will start being a part of human stories that are happening all around you, everywhere.
And once you become a part of stories, you will eventually become an empathic story teller who will complete the void and emptiness in other lives – as well as your own.
Are you listening, yet?
