Step Eleven, Part Two---Listening

Meditation for me became "listening" not just to the Group of Drunks but also to all the beings I came into contact with--human or otherwise--and to myself. An important part of "improving" this "conscious contact" was to listen, or try to directly experience, each contact in the moment and without old stories, without projections into the past or future.
Laura S., 12 Steps on Buddha's Path

Kate left a frantic message on my answering machine that she and Joe needed to see me ASAP because Joe had told her he was seriously thinking of separating. When they arrived in my office two days later, Joe was visibly agitated. He began the session by saying, "I can't take this any longer! I know I'm supposed to stay on my side of the street and work my program, but I just can't deal with Kate anymore!" With that Joe, who has about six years of recovery from a cocaine-alcohol-sexual addiction, lapsed into a hostile silence.

Kate immediately responded, "Oh, it's all my fault, isn't it! I'm the evil wife, the crazy bitch! But I'm not the one who ruined everything because of my drinking and drugging! I'm not the one who slept around with everyone while my spouse struggled to keep things together!" And then Kate lapsed into a rageful silence of her own.

What a struggle it was to get them to start listening to each other's pain without angry attacks and defensive counter-criticism. It was clear that Joe and Kate had stopped listening to each other a long time ago, long before Joe acknowledged his addictions and made a commitment to recovery. After a brief honeymoon of a few weeks when Joe stopped using and started going to AA and SA, both of them had gone back to their old pattern of Joe saying he couldn't stand Kate's treatment of him and Kate justifying her behavior by blasting Joe for what he had done to her. It was a predictable, never changing, and ultimately boring interaction that both of them were quite tired of, but neither could seem to let go of. It was Joe who was finally ready to throw in the towel and end this unhappy relationship.

It seems to me that the meditation part of Step Eleven is helpful not only for improving our conscious contact with our Higher Power, but is also a very useful tool for learning how to listen. First we learn to listen to the incessant chatter of our own minds and to notice the constant judging, complaining, wishing, and planning of our egos. We learn how to listen without being totally caught up in our ego's stories. As we begin to learn to detach from the ego's demand for attention and gratification, we also begin to learn how to listen to our partners without our old, habitual stories. We begin to learn how to be fully present in the present with our partners, letting go of our biased memories of the past and our distorted projections of the future. As a result we begin to experience more direct contact with our partners, hearing, seeing, and understanding them as they are in the moment and realizing they are much more complicated and filled with possibilities than we once believed.

If there is one piece of advice I would give to every couple as they embark on the path of recovery it would be to learn how to listen to each other with full attention and respect. That alone doesn't guarantee that the path will always be smooth and easy, but it does guarantee they will find it much easier to navigate their way around whatever obstacles they encounter on that path.