The Listening Path: The Creative Art of Attention

Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way revolutionized many people's approach to creativity. In The Listening Path, Cameron shares her experience and wisdom and warmly invites readers to add a daily walk to their tool kits, as a means of tapping into the moment and paying attention.

The Artist's Way caused a tectonic shift in opening the way to creativity; The Listening Path asks readers to go deep within, and will most benefit those who've embraced Cameron's previous book. The six-week practice offered here includes personal anecdotes and also interviews with people Cameron considers excellent listeners, from actors and authors to a physical trainer and real estate agent. After a brief refresher in which she expands on and deepens the practice of daily Morning Pages and weekly Artist's Dates, Cameron introduces a more meditative practice, refined with the benefit of time and experience. Week One begins gently, with "Listening to Our Environment," and suggests readers keep a log of their daily soundtrack (the alarm clock, the microwave buzzer). In Week Two, "Listening to Others," she encourages readers to observe in conversations who is "rehearsing what they will say next... [and] aren't truly present" versus those who really listen. Cameron moves readers from a tangible practice into a spiritual realm in the next three weeks. She urges open-mindedness; as the mind quiets, what she calls the "still small voice" may emerge, whether it's a voice within or the voice of a loved one.

Cameron closes with "Listening to the Silence," and readers who make a practice of her ideas will gain a newfound appreciation of being fully attentive to the present, aware and listening. --Jennifer M. Brown, senior editor

Powered by: Xtenit