A Celebration of Disciplined Listening: Learnings from Couple Enrichment at Home and in the Meeting

This program is co-sponsored by Friends Couple Enrichment

Quakers speak often of listening: listening for the still small voice, listening to God, listening to each other. A favorite quote from Douglas Steere is about “listening another into wholeness.” But how often do we stop and think about HOW we listen? Do we recognize listening as a spiritual muscle that can be trained and strengthened? Do we offer experiential support to help us learn to listen as a vital part of peacemaking?

In their 22 years of work with Friends Couple Enrichment, Mike and Marsha Green have come to appreciate how having a structure – or discipline – around listening can transform listening from a passive reception of information into a dynamic, growth-enhancing opportunity. In the past year they have experimented with how to incorporate disciplined listening into the work of Meeting committees, board meetings, emotionally-fraught discussions of racial equity, and other opportunities.

In this talk, they will share their experiences of ways that bringing discipline to our listening can affect those around us, and invite participants to experience this discipline.

Leader(s)

For 30 years, Mike and Marsha Green have found themselves called to nurture the life of families and meetings. They have done so through committee service, clerking, and offering classes, workshops, and retreats at home and around the U.S. Since 1998 they have facilitated workshops as a leader couple under the care of Friends Couple Enrichment, and from 2000 to 2016 Mike served as a core teacher in the School of the Spirit Ministry’s program On Being a Spiritual Nurturer. Marsha was on the board of the Carolina Friends School from 2011-16, serving as clerk for six of those years. More recently, they served as Resident Friends at the Friends Center in Auckland, New Zealand. They have been married for 38 years and have 3 grown children.

Travel directions to Pendle Hill.