How we Must Listen

The key to effective multicultural leadership is listening. In heartful classrooms and workshops, we help people develop mutlicultural leadership skills through listening, and then give students the opportunity to hear many different perspectives and stories through Heartfulness exercises and interaction with guest speakers and visitors.

Multicultural Listening

While being a TA in Dr. Murphy-Shigematsu's Heartfulness classroom I witnessed firsthand how creating a space for intentional listening informed by Dr. Murphy-Shigematsu's training as a cultural and clincial psychologists. Heartfulness practices create "optimal conditions to reduce prejudice" among diverse individuals by supporting people from diverse racial backgrounds in engaging with each other in deep and compassionate ways.

In Dr. Murphy-Shigematsu classroom, as a TA I observed that we discussed challenging topics such as racism towards BIPOC individuals and historical atrocities like the creation of Japanese internment camps.

Students handled these challenging conversations with grace and respect. We didn't have these conversations in the early days of the class, more like after four or five sessions of meeting.

One of Dr. Murphy-Shigematsu's students described "What happens in this class is a kind of tiny miracle. We cross borders, inside ourselves and between us and others, finding the connections that we hunger for and realize that’s what we need to keep going. We’re filled with gratitude for each other and just for being here." (Shigematsu, 2016).

How do we cross borders within ourselves and between each other?

We have to listen to others to first recognize what borders are there, borders like prejudice, racism, and unequal opportunity.

What keeps us divided and what do we have in common? Multicultural leaders need to be able to overcome barriers and unite people, focusing on values of equity and justice.

Dr. Murphy-Shigematsu writes in his book From Mindfulness to Heartfulness

"Leaders have to ask their people how they can become

even better leaders and then must listen, so that they may

learn whether they’re leading in the right or the wrong direction.

If they are truly open, they may even learn what followers

think of their leadership. Listening may be the most

important leadership skill" (Shigematsu, p. 133).

Once we practice listening and compassion we can begin to learn how the experience of someone from a different culture or racial background is similar and different to ours. Then, we can begin to address systemic barriers and take community responsibility for building a more just and equitable world, confronting racism and prejudice.

1. "With acts and practices of racial oppression being more apparent and discussed than ever, it is important to analyze the skills of an effective listener in order to functionally target communication between cultures. The role of listening within an intercultural context should be to actively engage. "(Baires, 2021).

I would argue that this intercultural communication is the strongest pillar on which multicultural leadership is build in Heartfulness.

This Baires article highlights a few points that are particularly salient, experiences similar to what surfaced in our Heartfulness classroom.

The article mentions several things that can make intercultural communication less effective. First, if someone is "multitasking", which in this paper is defined as focusing on particular more insignificant details while the individual is speaking (dates, details, names, etc.), this can lead to a barrier and lack of connection and understanding. In addition, if the listener interjects with too many clarifying questions, these clarifying questions could contain content that is racially offensive to the speaker. Therefore, listeners should be thoughtful about the questions that they ask. Lastly, in the case of language barriers between cultures, listeners must display patience and compassion. These are practical tips we can take away from this scientific article to be better listeners across cultural divides.

In our Hearfulness classroom we discuss the Japanese word Ma, a word that captures the empty space between things, the silence between musical notes and meaningful breaks between words. There is beauty in this emptiness

.By introducing Japanese words like Ma to students, Dr. Murphy-Shigematsu is teaching his classroom the importance of listening and creating compassionate, respectful space as a listener and in a multicultural way, introducing a Japanese word to students of different backgrounds.

As part of multicultural leadership, Heartfulness at Stanford sponsors and supports visiting international guest speakers. These speakers expand students understanding, compassion, and view of the world. As a Heartfulness fellow, I organized and handled the logistics to support both of these talks. It was such a privilege to engage both with Dr. Majied and with Dr. Arai within the same exact week.

Within 4 days, we had an incredible professor and therapist presenting on Black cultural an artistic practices and a renowned Buddhist scholar.

Heartfulness teaches multicultural leadership by first teaching deep listening with compassion and respect and then offering various opportunties to practice this listening to international guest speakers. As the experiencies of others are heard and embraced (even the challenging ones of historical injustices), attention can be directed to equity and justice. We must know what's happening and the experience of others to create a more equitable, just, and compassionate world.