Paying attention

I have recently been reading the book ' A More Loving World' by The School of Life which explores our ideas about love and, consequently, our behaviour - both loving and unloving - towards other people and the fact that much unloving behaviour is born out of judgement. On the other hand 'when we consider someone through the eyes of love..... what we are first and foremost doing is studying them closely, solicitously and with benevolence. For once, we are enquiring what might actually be motivating them, what they might have been through and the distinctive forces that have shaped them, as particular as the patterns on bark [of a tree]'. They go on to say that 'It may have been a very long time - perhaps since early childhood - since someone took a proper interest in details about us, sincerely enquired how we are feeling, looked at each of our fingers, caressed the back of our heads or delved into the nuances of what excites and saddens us'.

Yes, this may be true and the reason for much angry, aggressive, cynical, dismissive, cruel, jealous or otherwise disruptive behaviour in this world. Because we all seek loving attention which is loving precisely because it seeks to understand.

Our mean-spirited, disruptive behaviour is our way of blaming others for not seeing us, for not understanding us, for not caring enough to enquire about what motivates us or to understand our desires, our fears, our anxieties. And yet, and yet... how many of us take the time to understand ourselves? How many of us spend the time to really know what is motivating us, to know what we are avoiding, what we really need, what is really going on with us?

As Russ Hudson says 'We don't really know ourselves very well' and yet, paradoxically, we expect others to understand us. A more productive way to go is perhaps to invest some more of our own time and energy in working to better understand ourselves. And then, guess what? Maybe it won't matter so much if we feel a bit ignored or misunderstood because at least, then, we will know that we have not ignored ourselves and that we understand why we are doing what we are doing even if those around us don't. We will feel more secure in our choices and way of being because of our level of self-understanding. And because there is another paradox: that the more we learn about ourselves, the more we understand others, and the more we learn about others, the more we understand ourselves.

I know this to be the case with me. I really didn't know myself at all before I started to work with the Enneagram. I had not a clue. It has been - and still is - the greatest adventure.