Listening To The Whispers

It’s 3 years since I’ve written in this blog and like the character in the Paul Coelho book The Alchemist, I feel like I’ve been on a big and sometimes challenging journey and ended up back where I started, however altered and wiser for it. I’ve worked through various challenges and step by step I’ve been re-shaping my life to create more space for creating.

I’ve recently completed writing a chapter for a friend’s book about creating equality at work for women and men. My chapter is on the historical context and what I believe underpins our current patriarchal world and what we need to do to restore balance personally and planetarily. I’m about to share some photographs in a Brisbane exhibition titled ‘Restore: Re-enchanting Connection’ at Kepk Gallery in Brisbane 3rd-9th December. Both of these led me back to this blog and the importance of connection and ‘listening to the whispers’ is a key part of that.

‘Listening to the Whispers’ is a phrase that came to me many years ago, when I was writing about how to come back into balance and wellness both personally and planetarily as part of a Masters degree in Social Ecology, having recently left a corporate career that felt unhealthy, unsatisfying, and unsustainable.

Whilst sitting quietly in nature one day asking for clarity, I was guided to ‘listen to the whispers’, the quiet, wise voice inside us all that is connected to the source of all things. It shines a light on my circumstances when I access it by quietening my mind, asking a question and then listening and by that I mean being in a receptive state. When I ask for guidance or clarity about my current circumstances or challenges the answers I hear sometimes surprise me and always feels supportive.

I made a decision over 25 years ago to not only listen but to act on the knowing I receive. 

I quickly learned that listening to my feelings and acting on my intuition meant embracing uncertainty, letting go of perceived control whilst acknowledging but not catering to my fears. It required an act of faith to listen and then act, no matter what. I chose to, as Susan Jeffers advises in her book of the same name, “feel the fear and do it anyway”. David Whyte says, “that the price of our vitality is the sum of all our fears, that the price of our passion and commitment involves the shattering of deep personal illusions of immunity and safety.” I learned that life can be a dance between receiving and acting.

A brief synopsis of what happened for me personally as I took one intuitive, committed step at a time, was every aspect of my life changed and I continue to be led to more authenticity, creativity and connection.  I naturally moved toward connection to community, in a regional area rather than a city, connecting to the earth through regular time in nature and these both led to a deeper felt sense of spiritual connection, a direct experience of being connected to an intelligence greater than my own.

An unexpected outcome was that I became more conscious of the way I, and we humans collectively, are impacting the health of the planet and began modifying my consumer choices to reduce my consumption of resources. It was organic and visceral, I began to feel discomfort in my solar plexus if I reached to buy something in plastic packaging. The process continues to lead me toward a life that is more balanced, fulfilled and sustainable.

I say I was ‘led’ as I began to see a wisdom at play that inspired my choices with unexpected outcomes far superior to anything I could have or would have created through my limited understanding or logic alone. Quietening my busy and sometimes anxious mind and listening for inspiration became my mode of operating. My logical mind was now in healthy and supportive partnership with my intuitive knowing. I learned that my emotions when acknowledged and released in a healthy way, freed up this path of internal communication and connected me to my internal compass.

I believe the key to healing our societal and ecological issues is for individuals to foster a healthy relationship with their inner world; valuing and developing emotional intelligence, listening to and validating feelings and intuitions and acting wholistically from that internally connected place.  Like the natural world the soul is not controllable, however there is wisdom and wholeness to be found there, as I discovered when I made a commitment to listen to mine.

Everyone has access to their inner knowing, the quiet voice that speaks often with simple, yet clear directions on the path or action to take, the trick is to quieten our busy minds to hear it. I often hear mine when on walks in nature or engrossed in mundane tasks. We often ignore this voice because of a fear of the unknown. I have learned in living this way that often only the next step becomes clear and I have to take it faithfully without knowing what the step after that is to be. It requires trust that there is a greater and benevolent wisdom at play beyond my limited understanding.

Fear of the unknown and a lack of faith in the benevolence of life cuts us off from the very medicine we need; to listen to and act on our individual and collective inner wisdom and collaborate and enter into real partnership with each other and also with the natural world.

What supports you to access your inner knowing?