Instructions for Listening Meditation

Try to sit stable like a mountain and vast like the ocean.

Listen to the sounds as they occur.
Do not imagine, name, or analyze the sounds.
Just listen with wide-open awareness.

Let the sounds come to you and touch your eardrums.
Go inside the sounds and notice their fluid nature.
If there are no sounds, listen, and rest in this moment of silence.
Notice how sounds arise upon certain conditions and disappear upon others.
Do not grasp at any sounds.
Do not reject any sounds.
Just be aware of sounds as they arise and pass away. Open yourself to the music of the world in this moment, in this place.
In your daily life, notice the positive and negative habits you might have in your approach to listening.
What helps you to listen fully and spaciously?

If you are in a place that is very noisy, how can you help yourself? Must you find a quieter place or wear earplugs? Or can you be with these sounds in a different way?

See if you can learn to move freely between being in silence and with sounds.

♦

For further reading see Martine Batchelor’s “Meditation, Mental Habits, and Creative Imagination.”

To participate in her online retreat, click here.