THE FIRST KIND OF HELPING: HELPING ANOTHER PERSON FOCUS WHILE TALKING

A. Absolute listening¹ If you set aside a period of time when you only listen, and indicate only whether you follow or not, you will discover a surprising fact. People can tell you much more and also find more in­side themselves, than can ever happen in ordinary inter­changes.

If you use only expressions such as "Yes," or "I see," or "Oh yes, I can sure see how you feel," or "I lost you, can you say that again, please?" you will see a deep process unfold.

In ordinary social interchange we nearly always stop each other from getting very far inside. Our advice, re­actions, encouragements, reassurances, and well-inten­tioned comments actually prevent people from feeling understood. Try following someone carefully without putting anything of your own in. You will be amazed.

Give the speaker a truthful sense of when you follow, and when not. Immediately you will be a good listener. But you must be truthful and indicate when you fail to follow. ("Can you say that another way? I didn't get it")

However, it helps much more if you the listener will say back the other person's points, step by step, as you understand them. I call that absolute listening.

Never introduce topics that the other person didn't express. Never push your own interpretations. Never mix in your own ideas.

There are only two reasons for speaking while listen­ing: to show that you understand exactly by saying back what the other person has said or meant, or to ask for repetition or clarification.

To show that you understand exactly Make a sen­tence or two that gets at the personal meaning this per­son wanted to put across. This will usually be in your own words, but use that person's own words for the touchy main things.

People need to hear you speak. They need to hear that you got each step. Make a sentence or two for every main point they make, for each thing they are trying to get across. (Usually, this will be for about every five or ten sentences of theirs.) Don't just "let them talk," but relate to each thing that they feel, whether it's good or bad. Don't try to fix or change or improve it. Try to get the crux of it exactly the way they mean it and feel it.

Sometimes what people say is complicated. You can't get what they say, nor what it means to them, all at once. First, make a sentence or two about the crux of what they said. Check that out with them. Let them correct it and add to it if they want to. Take in, and say back, what they have changed or added, until they agree that you have it just as they feel it. Then make another sentence to say what it means to them, or how they feel it.

Example: Suppose a woman has been telling you about some intricate set of events, what some people did to her and how and when, to "put her down."

First, you would say one or more sentences to state in words the crux of what she said as she sees it. Then she corrects some of how you said it, to get it more exactly. You then say back her corrections: "Oh, so it wasn't that they all did that, but all of them agreed to it." Then she might add a few more things, which you again take in and say back more or less as she said them. Then, when you have it just right, you make another sentence for the personal meaning or feeling that whole thing has: "And what's really bad about it is that it's made you feel put down."

If you don't understand what the person is saying, or you get mixed up or lost, there is a way to ask for repetition or clarification. Don't say, "I didn't under­stand any of it." Rather, take whatever bits you did understand, even if it was very vague, or only the be­ginning, and use it to ask for more:

"I do get that this is important to you, but I don't get what it is yet...."

Don't say a lot of things you aren't sure the person meant. The person will have to waste lots of time ex­plaining to you why what you said doesn't fit. Instead, just say what you are sure you heard and ask them to repeat the rest.

Say back bit by bit what the person tells you. Don't let the person say more than you can take in and say back. Interrupt, say back, and let the person go on.

How you know when you are doing it right. You know this when people go further into their problems. For example, the person may say, "No, it's not like that, it's more like—uh—" and then may feel further into it to see how it actually feels. You have done it right. Your words may have been wrong, or may now sound wrong to the person even though they were very close to what the person said a moment before. But what matters is that your words led the person to feel further into the problem so your words had the right result. Whatever the person then says, take that in and say it back. It's a step further.

Or the person may sit silently, satisfied that you get everything up to now.

Or the person may show you a release, a relaxing, a whole-bodied "Yes, that's what it is," a deep breath, a sigh. Such moments occur now and then, and after them new or further steps come.

You may also tell that it is going right by more subtle signs of the relaxation that comes from being heard well —the feeling we all get when we have been trying to say something and have finally put it across: the feeling that we don't have to say that any more. While a person is laying out an idea, or part of one, there is a tension, a holding of breath, which may remain for several inter­changes. When the crux is finally both said and exactly understood and responded to, there is relaxation, like an exhaling of breath. The person doesn't have to hold the thing in the body any more. Then something further can come in. (It's important to accept the silence that can come here for what seems like a long time, even a minute or so. The focuser now has the inner body peace to let another thing come up. Don't destroy the peace by speaking needlessly.)

How you know when you did it wrong» and what to do about that. If nearly the same thing is said over again, it means the person feels you haven't got it yet. See how the focuser's words differ from what you said. If nothing feels different, then say it again and add to it, "But that's not all, or that's not right, some way?"

As you respond, the focuser's face may get tight, tense, confused. This shows that the focuser is trying to understand what you are saying. So you must be doing it wrong, adding something or not getting it. Stop and ask the person again to say how it is.

If the focuser changes the subject (especially to some­thing less meaningful or less personal), it means he or she gave up on getting the more personal thing across right. You can interrupt and say something like, "I'm still with what you were just trying to say about.... I know I didn't understand it right, but I want to." Then say only the part of it you're sure of, and ask the person to go on from there.

You will get it right sooner or later. It doesn't matter when. It can be the third or fourth try. People can get further into their feelings best when another person is receiving or trying to receive each bit exactly as they have it, without additions or elaborations. There is a centeredness that is easy to recognize after a while. Like a train on a track. It's easy to know when you're off. Everything stops. If that happens, go back to the last point that was on a solid track inside, and ask the per­son to go on from there.

If you find it hard to accept someone with unlovely qualities, think of the person as being up against these qualities inside. It is usually easy to accept the person inside who is struggling against these very qualities. As you listen, you will then discover that person.

When you first practice listening, be sure to repeat al­most word for word what people say. This helps you see how hard it is to get what a person is trying to say without adding to it, fixing it, putting yourself into it.

When you are able to do that, then feed back only the crux, the point being made, and the feeling words.

To make it easier, stop for a second and sense your own tangle of feelings, tensions, and expectations. Then clear this space. Out of this open space you can listen. You will feel alert and probably slightly excited. What will the other person say into this waiting space that exists for nothing except to be spoken into?

Very rarely is anyone offered such a space by another person. People hardly ever move over in themselves enough to really hear another.

B. Helping a felt sense form. It is possible for a person to focus a little between one communication and the next. Having made a point, and being understood, the person can focus before saying the next thing.

Most people don't do that. They run on from point to point, only talking. How can you help people stop, and get the felt sense of what they have just said?

This is the second focusing movement. Finding the felt sense is like saying to oneself, "That, right there, that's what's confused," and then feeling it there.

The focuser must keep quiet, not only outwardly but also inside, so that a felt sense can form. It takes as long as a minute.

Some people talk all the time, either out loud or at themselves inside. Then nothing directly felt can form, and everything stays a painful mass of confusion and tightness.

When a felt sense forms, the focuser feels relief. It's as if all the bad feeling goes into one spot, right there, and the rest of the body feels freer.

Once a felt sense forms, people can relate to it. They can wonder what's in it, can feel around it and into it.

When to help people let a felt sense form When peo­ple have said all that they can say clearly, and from there on it is confusing, or a tight unresolved mess, and they don't know how to go on.

When there is a certain spot that you sense could be gone into further.

When people talk round and round a subject and never go down into their feelings of it. They may start to say things that are obviously personal and meaning­ful, but then go on to something else. They tell you nothing meaningful, but seem to want to. In this very common situation, you can interrupt the focuser and gently point out the way into deeper levels of feeling.

FOCUSER: "I've been doing nothing but taking care of Karen since she's back from the hospital. I haven't been with me at all. And when I do get time now, I just want to run out and do another chore."

LISTENER: "You haven't been able to be with yourself for so long, and even when you can now, you don't."

FOCUSER: "She needs this and she needs that and no matter what I do for her it isn't enough. All her family are like that. It makes me angry. Her father was like that, too, when he was sick, which went on for years. They're always negative and grumpy and down on each other."

LISTENER: "It makes you angry the way she is, the way they are."

FOCUSER: "Yes. I'm angry. Damn right. It's a poor climate. Living in a poor climate. Always gray. Al­ways down on something. The other day, when I—"

LISTENER (interrupts): "Wait. Be a minute with your angry feeling. Just feel it for a minute. See what more is in it. Don't think anything...."

How to help a felt sense form. There is a gradation of how much help people need to contact a felt sense. Al­ways do the least amount first, and more only if that doesn't work.

Some people won't need any help except your will­ingness to be silent. If you don't talk all the time, and if you don't stop them or get them off the track, they will feel into what they need to feel into. Don't interrupt a silence for at least a minute. Once you have responded and checked out what you said and gotten it exactly right, be quiet.

The person may need one sentence or so from you, to make the pause in which a felt sense could form. Such a sentence might simply repeat slowly the last im­portant word or phrase you already said. It might just point again to that spot. For instance, in the previous example you might have said slowly and emphatically: "Really angry." Then you would stay quiet. The per­son's whole sense of all that goes with being angry should form.

Whatever people say after your attempt to help them find a felt sense, say the crux of it back. Don't worry if you can't immediately create the silent deeper period you feel is needed. You can try it again soon. Go along with whatever comes up, even if the focuser has wan­dered off the track momentarily.

If after many tries the people still aren't feeling into anything, then you can tell them to do so more directly. Say explicitly, "Sit with it a minute and feel into it further." You can also give all or some of the focusing instructions.

You can form a question for people. Tell them to ask this question inwardly, to ask not the head but the gut. "Stay quiet and don't answer the question in words. Just wait with the question till something comes from your feeling."

Questions like that are usually best open-ended. "What really is this?" "What's keeping this the way it is?"

Another type of question applies to the "whole thing." "Where am I really hung up in this whole thing?" Use it when everything is confused or when the focuser doesn't know how to begin.

If the focuser has let a felt sense form but is still stuck, it may help to ask, "How would it be different if it were all OK? What ought it to be like?" Tell the per­son to feel that ideal state for a while and then ask, "What's in the way of that?" The focuser shouldn't try to answer the question but should get the feel of what's in the way.

All these ways require that the focuser stop talking, both out loud and inside. One lets what is there come instead of doing it oneself.

Just ask, "Where's my life still hung up?" This will give you the felt sense of the problems fast, if you don't answer with words.

Another approach: pick the two or three most im­portant things the focuser has said if you feel they go together into one idea. Then tell the person, "When I say what Гт going to say, don't you say anything to me or to yourself. Just feel what comes there." Then say the two or three things, each in one or two words.

These ways can also help when a person doesn't want to say some private or painful thing. The focuser can work on it without actually telling you what it is. You can listen and help without knowing what it is about, beyond the fact that it hurts or puzzles in some way.

How you can tell when it isn't working. When people look you straight in the eyes, then they aren't yet focus­ing inside themselves. Say, "You can't get into it while you're looking at me. Let me just sit here while you go into yourself."

If people speak immediately after you get through asking them to be quiet, they haven't focused yet. First, say back the crux of what was said and then ask the focuser to contact the felt sense of it. К you've worked hard on it and nothing useful has happened, let it go fifteen minutes or so and try again.

If, after a silence, the person comes up with explana­tions and speculations, ask how that problem feels. Don't criticize the person for analyzing. Pick up on what the person does say and keep pointing into a felt sense of it.

If people say they can't let feeling come because they are too restless or tense, feel empty or discouraged, or are trying too hard, ask them to focus on that. They can ask themselves (and not answer in words), "What is this rattled feeling?" "... or tense feeling?" "... or empty feeling?" "... or 'trying too hard' thing?"

How to tell when a person has a felt sense One has a felt sense when one can feel more than one under­stands, when what is there is more than words and thoughts, when something is quite definitely experienced but is not yet clear, hasn't opened up or released yet.

You will know your focuser has a felt sense and is referring to it when that person gropes for words and evidently has something that is not yet in words.

Anything that comes in this way should be wel­comed. It is the organism's next step. Take it and say it back just the way the person tells it.

It feels good to have something come directly from one's felt sense. It shifts the feelings, releases the body slightly. Even if one doesn't like what has come, it feels good. It is encouraging when more is happening than just talk. It gives one a sense of process, freeing from stuck places.

This is the key concept in this process of listening, responding, and referring to people's feelings just as they feel them. It is based on the fact that feelings and troubles are not just concepts or ideas: they are bodily. Therefore the point of helping is never just to speculate, to explain. There has to be a physical process of steps into where the trouble is felt in the body. Such a process gets going when a good listener responds to the per­sonal, felt side of anything said, just as the person feels it, without adding anything. Felt movement and change happen when a person is given the peace to allow the bodily sense of a trouble to be, to be felt, and to move to its own next step.

A focuser can do this alone, but the presence and response of another person has a powerful helping ef­fect.

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