The Gall Bladder Meridian: The Governing Principle of My Listening

The Gall Bladder Meridian: the Official over my Listening

In order for my word to be powerful enough to create my world it has to be brought into existence inside the physical world immediately after I speak it. Otherwise it stays in my memory and gets distorted by all the history that is stored there. Memory is filled with upsets, problems, and withholds. It is as a morass and what remains in it is tainted by that dirty bog. The longer it stays there, the more corrupt and stained it becomes until it has no power whatsoever to create anything but resignation, complacency, malcontent, and cynicism.

My TMLP Notes

A Word about Memory

There is no such thing as a good memory. Even the so-called good memories are tainted by upsets, problems and withholds. The language I speak and the words I hear are tainted by my memory. Memory is not accurate. There is simply what happened, and then there is what I remember happening. The two never match up. Memory will always be distorted. Memory is like a Kangaroo Court in that it sets precedents that prescribe and proscribe actions based upon evidence that it supplies, conclusions it arrives at, and unfair justifications it takes. Its aim is to validate me. Relying on these faulty precedents and allowing them, by default, to determine what I do and have will choke out the possibility of miracles contributing to my life.

The already always listening

A memory is a lonely place with only one creature that inhabits its bog: a creature called the already always listening[1]. It is called thus because it was already and always listening before I ever arrived. I was born free of it, but as I began growing, it sprang up in my memory as I developed the ability to language. Languaging is the capacity to give meaning to what I perceive. The already always listening and language are close bedfellows. When I was a baby, all I heard was noises, and sounds. Then I discovered that some sounds were pleasant, and others were not. Then one day, I discovered that these noises actually meant something in the world out there. Gradually, I mastered an ever increasing capacity to language. I learned that by crying, my mother would respond. Then I learned her name, and I could call here to me. Language gave me access to other people. It also gave me power to manipulate others. There was a moment as a child that I realized that I actually knew and could speak English. I thought it odd, strange and incredible that I could language. Then I realized that that was just what people do: they language! It is through languaging that incoming and outgoing noise gave me access to the world. It was through my ability to language that I discovered meaning beyond what a thing just was. It was through language that I discovered ownership. I learned to say, “Mine!” My big question at that young age was, “What does that mean?” As I increased my capacity to language I also became attached to making meaning out of everything I perceived. Separating a perception from the meaning I ascribed to it, became increasingly less common until it became nonexistent.

The already always listening is a cultural listening that I inherited that tells me how things are supposed to be; what is right, wrong; what I should and shouldn’t do; what is good or bad; what I should believe or disbelieve. What is true and what is false. It judges you for me, and tells me if you are safe or not. It finds agreement with other already always listenings in the world out there. The already always listening throws a cloak over the real world, and makes it appear not so nasty to us. What I hear is a pristine illusion which has a faint resemblance to the truth. What I hear is an interpretation based on what I expect to hear. The already always listening hates unexpected twists, turns and punches. It thrives on predictability, punctuality, and clockwork. It has no room for the miraculous, or unexpected. At best, it creates a world which is functional, predictable, expected, manageable, tight, small, safe, and ideal; but at worst, there is no possibility in that world. It is damned. Its ulterior motive is to just get me through this life safe and sound. It has no regard for that which is inspiring, imaginative, lively, daring, wild, passionate, and freely flowing.

“I am listening to you” versus “I listen you”

The process of Listening begins by giving heed or attention to noises and sounds. First, I hear a sound. I then perceive that the sound has an intention behind it. So the sound disappears inside the intention that was created for it. As I learn the intentions that accompany each of the different sounds, I develop the capacity to listen. Listening is not simply hearing. I listen when I perceive the intention that was created for the sound. Better put, I listen when I distinguish the background of what is heard.

Listening becomes corrupt when the word to is attached to listen as in listens to. Then my listening has an object to aim at, as in “I am listening to you”. Listening looses its perceptive abilities when it is distinct from the object it is aimed at. Perceiving and discerning is lost in simply the hearing of a thing. To implies that I am over here, and you, the object of my listening, are over there. But this is a clever deception. It is not that you are over there, and I am over here; but that I pretend that you are over there. The truth is that I am not really listening to you; rather I am listening to the already always listening intercept what you are saying and interpret your words for me in a way that fits comfortably inside an illusory world the already always listening already created for me; that world I accepted unwittingly, and by default, as it sprang up in me as a child. So the deception is that I pretend that you are over there, when actually, a figment that resembles you is over here in my world, a figment created by my already always listening. I am not really getting what is over there in your world at all.

There is a mainstream listening of the concept of listening that implies that my listening has no effect upon the world already created out there. That world is simply an objective phenomenon that now can only be listened to. I am here, and that world is out there. But I was born into that world. That big world tainted little me; but that world is the world, I am me; the two are separate and distinct, and there is nothing that can be done to change it. The prevailing cultural consensus is that because I am distinct from the world and because the world is bigger and more vast than I am, I cannot affect a change in it; but at least I can change myself inside of that big world. So I settle. Since I can’t change the world, at least I can become something inside of that world. I can become righteous, better, obedient; I can become more, better, and different. I can become better than that world, which tainted me in the first place. I can rise above it.

Becoming springs from the already always listening. Becoming is based on memory. Becoming is reacting to the already always listening. It compares what is to what was. Only, what was is always what never was because it is a distortion of the past. Becoming then builds on evidence of how I never was, although I think I was, and prides itself in what I think I am now (but probably am not) based on what I was (but wasn’t). Or it denigrates itself, because I am worse off now (although I probably am better off, but don’t know it), than what I was before (but actually wasn’t). Becoming develops conclusive proof in the efficacy of struggling. Becoming inspires personal validation. It shows that if I struggle long enough, I can become whatever it is I want to become.

I become something by attaching myself to something: like a diploma, a license, a certificate or award, or a church, or nation, or country club. It is all about gaining, or loosing, as in gaining an education, or loosing a reputation, or ground. I am careful to avoid the wrong things for fear that I will become the wrong thing. I discipline myself through meditation, affirmations, (like if I say it long enough, I will be that way), prayer, keeping the commandments, and avoiding sin. Becoming is not bad, but it has nothing to do with creation. Creation is not based on the past. It does not come from the memory. The already always listening cannot reach into the world of creation. Creation comes from the space of nothing. For this reason, creation does not come from the words I speak, but from the listening that I offer. Creation comes from listening, not speaking.

Perhaps it seems that speaking creates my world because speaking is so much noisier than listening. I can hear speaking more than I can hear listening, so I assume that what I hear has more influence than what I can’t hear. But the truth is that what I don’t speak is what creates. I am reminded of what the Lord says, “In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength.” (Isaiah 30:15) That returning, confidence, quietness, and rest happens inside of listening, not speaking. There is a power that can be realized through developing the capacity to listen; not hearing, but listening, which is discerning the intention, or background behind what is heard. Creation by listening is a power that flows without compulsory means. It has no in order to’s. There is no manipulation in truly listening.

Inside this new distinction, listening will transform from being a passive reception of filtered noise that comes from a world already created “out there” to a penetrating envelopment that allows creation to occur; that creates a clearing for the godly to naturally manifest. Inside this new distinction, the context in which words are used will change. Rather than saying, “I am listening to you” I will correctly say, “I am listening you.”

“Keeping my Word” versus “Honoring my Word”

Another important distinction to make in understanding the function of the Gall Bladder Official is the difference between keeping and honoring my word. Keeping my word is usually considered an honorable thing, and it is, on a superficial level, or it appears honorable; but on a deeper level, it isn’t. Keeping my word is hording my word. It is refusing to put it out there to be tested in another’s listening for fear that it will be distorted, cheapened, or even blown apart. This position comes from a lack of trust in the power of my words. Words have incredible power and can only be destroyed and distorted by me. They are honored when they are put outside the bog of memory into worlds that are unfamiliar. Inside these unfamiliar worlds, words are honored by being cleaned up of the mess and stench they acquired while in the bog of memory. Getting them out of that bog is the best way to truly honor my words.

The parable of the talents Christ told comes to mind in my thinking about this. If I am keeping my word, I am hording my word; I am burying my word, and not putting it out there into your listening where it can be cleaned up, and multiplied tenfold and more[2]. The slothful steward listened his master as an austere man who reaped where he did not sow. I listen others according to the listening I sentenced myself to as a child. For this reason, the master said, “Out of thine own mouth I will judge thee.” My mouth betrays my listening. What comes out of my mouth is an indicator of whether or not I have cleaned up my speech by taking on having it cleaned inside the listening of another. It is the words that remain inside that bog that will judge me in the end. If we get them out of that bog, and immerse them in the clear pool of another’s listening, those words have an opportunity to be cleansed of the filth of that bog. If there are no more words in the bog, because I have cleaned them inside your listening, then there is no final judgment for me.

If I am always keeping my word, I am not putting my word out there in listenings that I am unfamiliar with. I am not trusting that your listening has power to catapult me into worlds of inspiration; whose entrance requires faith and humility, rather than know-how. The power to transform is found in my ability to confidently grasp your listening (although it may be difficult to be with), with my words, and in turn for your listening to transform or cleanse my words.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”[3] We are all Gods in the sense that we all have power to create. So a different twist on this scripture is that words are born in me as thoughts; then words be with me for long periods of time, because I usually don’t want to put them out there in the listening of another, (the longer they stay, the more tainted and corrupt they become); and then words are me (I am judged according to what comes out of my mouth). I am what I speak.

The spoken word has an incredible tendency to be transformed ongoingly by the listening it is with. Words can either stay transformed by the already always listening that resides in the bog of memory, or be transformed and cleaned up by another’s listening “outside the bog”. This cleaning happens only if I am open to it. If I am closed to it that is a sign that I really haven’t put my word “outside the bog”. I am still hording it in the bog of memory where it is tainted and corrupted even further.

I have a natural tendency to think the opposite is true. I am afraid that if I put my word “outside the bog”, it will be tainted by another’s already always listening, so I guard it cautiously in my own bog supposedly keeping it clean of judgments that might be hurled at it from the listenings of others. But this is not true; another’s listening always has potential to clean up my words, if I have the listening to allow it to happen.

When a word is initially received into my listening, whether it comes to me as a thought, or as a word from another, it is born into my memory, where it undergoes an immersion or laundering that corrupts its original intention. Words that come to me are first transformed away from their original intention by my already always listening. To be powerful, those words must be immersed again into another’s listening to be cleaned and transformed again. This is similar to the process of baptism.[4] When my words are cleaned inside another’s listening, those words take on the capacity to listen me into the transformation they were originally listened into before they entered into any bog. My word becomes God to me. It calls me forth into a possibility that transforms who I am, and the stand I take and am in life. This is the nature of my word’s grasp. On the other hand, when my word is received into your listening, your listening transforms my word, and my word is with both of us mutually. Our already always listenings are in turn transformed by that word that I honored by putting out there into your listening. Your listening cleans my word of all the filth it acquired by its brief or long stay in the morass of my memory, and after it is cleaned, that word has greater power to act in both our lives.

I enter through the transformational gate of birth/rebirth by taking on the nature and tendency of words. Words have the tendency to grasp other words, and join into sentences and conversations. They have a tendency to grasp and be transformed by the listening of those around me. When I speak, I take on an essence of being that grasps listening. When I listen I am a clearing for Virtue to show up that transforms the words I have listened. The words that have the strongest tendency to grasp are words which embody promises, declarations and powerful requests. All these wordforms have a tendency to bind those deeply engaged to a particular transformation that occurs because of the listening the promise was received into.

However (speaking about promises and declarations), there are promises and declarations that are easy to keep, that have little potential to grasp a transformative listening, and there are promises that have incredible potential to grasp a transformative listening. Promises that have little grasping potential are promises that I know how to keep. These promises are actually made by the already always listening. They come from the memory. Inside of a promise that I know how to keep, I become something. It is the already always listening that stretches myself. I settle for stretching, rather than a transformation. Promises that transform me into other worlds are promises that I have no idea how I am going to keep.

To experience a listening that transforms powerfully my word, I must make a promise or a declaration whose possibility for fulfillment has no validation in the world that presently encases me. In other words, the world seen through pre-transformed eyes doesn’t fit inside the world the new promise or declaration has inspired. I find I don’t know how I will keep it. I am incapable of grasping the know-how. I am inspired by the promise, but find myself not knowing how to keep it relying on my own powers and intellect. Knowing-how resides inside a world where I am not. That world could be inside the know-how of others, and it could also be found in a world that has not yet been discovered. Fulfilling upon the promise requires a powerful listening presence outside of me. This is transforming my life from a small life run by fear, timidity, and the instinct to survive, into a life that allows for the transforming influence of another’s listening. I then transform from being a self into being a relationship. This transformation only happens by honoring the words I make by courageously putting those words out into the listening presence of others. Therefore, transformation is not found in keeping my word, but in honoring my word.

This is all inside the function of the Liver/Gall bladder officials. These officials get your words out of the gutter, or bog of memory and immerse them into clear pools of other’s listenings. In this way, listenings, and words all get cleaned up.

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[1] This is a term coined by Werner Erhard. For more information on the “already Always Listening, see http://laurenceplatt.home.att.net/wernererhard/alreadya.html You will probably need to copy the address and paste it in you address box when you connect with the internet.

[2] “But with some I am not well pleased, for they will not open their mouths, but they hide the talents which I have given unto them, because of the fear of man. Wo unto such, for mine anger is kindled against them.” (D&C 60:2)

[3] John 1:1

[4] Therefore I give unto you a commandment, to teach these things freely unto your children, saying: That by reason of transgression cometh the fall, which fall bringeth death, and inasmuch as ye were born into the world by water, and blood, and the spirit, which I have made, and so became of dust a living soul, even so ye must be born again into the kingdom of heaven, of water, and of the Spirit, and be cleansed by blood, even the blood of mine Only Begotten; that ye might be sanctified from all sin, and enjoy the words of eternal life in this world, and eternal life in the world to come, even immortal glory; (Moses 6:58, 59)