On ListeningNadine Hoover By Nadine Hoover on January 26, 2007 When I ask you to listen to me and you start by giving advice, you have not done what I asked.
When I ask you to listen to me and you begin to tell me why I shouldn’t feel that way, you are trampling on my feelings.
[When I ask you to listen to me and you over-empathize, you steal my emotions and I have to care for you.]
When I ask you to listen to me and you feel you have to do something to solve my problem, you have failed me, strange as it may seem.
Listen! All I ask is that you listen, not talk or do… just hear me.
When you do something for me that I can and need to do for myself, you contribute to my fear and inadequacy.
And I can do for myself. I’m not helpless. Maybe discouraged and faltering, but not helpless.
But when you accept as simple fact that I do feel what I fee, no matter how irrational, then I can quit trying to convince you and get about the business of understanding what’s behind this irrational feeling. And when that’s clear, the answers are obvious and I don’t need advice.
Irrational feelings make sense when we understand what’s behind them.
Perhaps that’s why prayer works, sometimes, for some people… because God is mute, and He or She doesn’t give advice or try to fix things. God just listens and lets you work it out yourself.
So, please listen and just hear me. And if you want to talk, wait a minute for your turn, and I’ll listen to you.
Ralph Roughton’s reflections on listening were discussed at a meeting of the Older Friends Group of Hartford (Conn.) Meeting and were published in the meeting’s newsletter in April 1981. [Addition by Nadine Hoover.]
Queries for the Conversion of MannersNadine Hoover By Nadine Hoover on January 16, 2007 Convincement and conviction may be instantaneous, but the conversion of manners is a journey of a lifetime.
Where is the Life in it; how is the Life moving? Is there Life in this insight or message?
Is it a message from the Spirit? Where is it coming from?
How is the inward life shaping and guiding my outward life?
How does my outward life express my inward experience?
Does it keep me in the Life? (testimony)
Does it take me out of it? (acknowledgement)
Can I name Truth given to me and how is it working within me?
What is the Light for the next step?
God never asks more than I am able;
have faith and if it’s really too much ask, what over gods am I serving?
What is for me—to keep close and let it work on me?
What is for someone else—for me to deliver faithfully?
What is for us as a faith community—for us to record, test, and yield to?
What is for another faith community—for us to deliver faithfully?
What is for us as a religious society—for us to share, test, and yield to?
With whom are we called to test it—neighboring meetings, regional meeting, yearly meeting, religious society, nation, or world?
Tests of Spiritual DiscernmentNadine Hoover By Nadine Hoover on January 14, 2007 Internal silence, soul, conscience
Simplicity
Listening and plain speaking
Wrestling, laboring
Persistence
Bringing down low, the cross
Scripture, histories of religious people
Testing with F/friends
Testing with meeting
Fruits of the Spirit
Tests of LeadingsNadine Hoover By Nadine Hoover on January 09, 2007 Flee, be silent, pray always
Internal silence; the soul; the conscience
Simplicity; direct relationship
Plain speaking; listening to where things come from
Persistence over time
Bringing down low; not upward to power and privilege; the cross
Nearly impossible
Scripture; stories of religious peoples
Wrestling; laboring
Spiritual discernment of others
Fruits of the Spirit; is there life in it?
Michael Sheeran pg 24-29 (27)
Cooperative AgreementNadine Hoover By Nadine Hoover on January 07, 2007 Show respect for self and others
Affirm self and others ; no put downs
Listen, don’t interupt
Participate, K.I.S.S. (keep it short and simple)
Volunteer one’s self only
Use of information sensitively and compassionately
Everyone has the right to pass
Preparation for Faithful ServiceNadine Hoover By Nadine Hoover on January 01, 2007 Changing myself is so consuming I no longer focus on trying to change “them.” I ask myself, do I:
Regard no one as the enemy?
Work through friendship and cooperation?
Maintain honesty and integrity in my dealings?
Maintain openness and transparency in my finances?
Use what I need and share the rest?
Oppose conditions and acts of violence, abuse and neglect, rather than persons?
Not take sides, understanding that everyone is needed for peace?
Accept, with humility, that my understandings are incomplete?
Call everyone to practice principles universal among faiths: integrity, community, simplicity, equality in diversity, peace and nonviolence, compassionate justice and reconciliation?
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