Can Anybody Hear God's Voice?
Ch 5 in Listening for Guidance: A Little Known but Life-Changing Spiritual Practice
When I first began Listening for Guidance, I kept it pretty much to myself. But, it wasn’t long before I just had to tell someone that I could hear God’s voice. That someone was my stepmother, Lois.
As it happens, Lois didn’t become my stepmother until I was almost 30. But we bonded quickly. Growing up, I knew her from church camp and other events where multiple congregations of our faith tradition gathered. She had a son my age. I respected her spirituality and she respected mine.
So after dinner one Sunday, I sat her down and told her my secret with great excitement and expectation. She listened with rapt attention to every detail.
I began the conversation by relating the story of how I first learned about Listening for Guidance.
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The Story of My First Guidance
When I first sat to listen for Guidance (in my late 30s), the only preparation I had was a brief class at a retreat. Gail had given us a little notebook and a pen. She led us through some warm-up exercises designed to get us to access our creative side. Then she gave us directions.
Sometime during the remainder of the retreat, go find yourself a quiet spot. Take out your notebook and write a letter to God. Share with God your concerns and questions.
Next, turn to a fresh page. At the top, write "To my Daughter…" followed by your name.
Just write whatever comes into your head.
So I did just that. I found a quiet spot. I began just as she said. And the words flowed into my head.
What I heard was affirming and meaningful. It was the beginning of a new, life-altering, personal relationship with God.
And, surprisingly, easy-peasy.
Then Lois Tried to Hear God’s Voice
Once I finished my story, I told Lois some of the things God had said to me. I suggested she might want to give it a try.
She agreed that it sounded like a worthwhile thing to do. And it sounded easy enough. She was eager to try it for herself.
She did try it. And called to report what she had heard: Absolutely. Nothing.
I was at a loss as to what the problem was. For me, it was easy. That’s all I knew.
That was the end of guidance for Lois.
At the time, because of Lois’ failure, I came to believe my success with Listening for Guidance must be a gift. It seemed like some people had it, and others did not. I thought I was special.
I no longer believe that.
It's Not a Question of Ability
What I believe now is that anyone can hear God’s voice. Anybody can succeed at Listening for Guidance.
It’s just that some people seem to be naturally better able to hear the voice. Better able to quickly access the part of the brain involved in communicating with the source of inner wisdom (whether that be God or Higher Power or Authentic Self or some other source).
In other words, my gift is the ease of access. It’s just like the way some people, say Mozart, can compose music with seemingly little effort. And other people, say Salieri, struggle mightily to accomplish the same task.
(Remember what Salieri said in the movie Amadeus? It’s as if he’s taking dictation. Sounds like Listening for Guidance, doesn’t it?)
It has taken me more than three decades to finally learn what’s going on here in terms of whether someone hears God’s voice or not. I’d like to share with you what I’ve discovered.
Write Some Morning Pages
In early 2024, Julia Cameron published Living the Artist’s Way. This book is entirely devoted to stories of the way Listening for Guidance has become an integral part of her life. As she weaves her tales, she offers a few insights about how to do it.
Her secret is that she writes Morning Pages to become receptive. She says Morning Pages are a lead-in to hearing the voice.
In case you aren’t familiar, Morning Pages are the first of four tools Cameron teaches to creatives who are feeling blocked in their work. She calls what she teaches, “creative recovery.” (In a tie-back to the Oxford Group, note that Cameron was a member of AA in her early years.)
Here’s how to do Morning Pages. First thing in the morning, before you do anything else (except maybe making a cup of coffee), write out three 8½” x 11” (or A4) pages of longhand about whatever is on your mind.
You might write down things you need to do, or thoughts about projects that occurred to you in the night, or how you’re worried about something you saw on the news. It can be anything. It can even be, I don’t know what to write.
Why Morning Pages?
The goal is to clear out the chatter in your head. You want to clear out the voices of those parts of ego, like your inner critic, that are always competing for your attention.
In giving those voices the attention they demand, you silence them. Once they are silenced, you can hear the voice you want to hear—the only voice that’s left. As Julia says:
Beyond the reach of the Censor’s babble we find our own quiet center, the place where we hear the still, small voice that is at once our creator’s and our own.
God concurs with Julia. As I was listening and writing in my spiritual journal on May 5, 2024, I received this message:
…Teach Morning Pages as the best alternative way into my presence, the best way to get to theta waves, if someone is having trouble with it.
Well, okay. Good to know. But now, of course, I need to explain theta waves.
The Science of Hearing God’s Voice
I first learned about theta waves in doing research for my soon-to-be-released memoir. I was reading Writing Down Your Soul by Janet Conner. In the introduction, she relates a story about a talk she presented at a bookstore.
Is deep soul writing journaling? When you journal, you get into the alpha brainwave state where you can do some solid self-reflection, but, when you soul write, you drop all the way into theta, sometimes even mystical theta. Theta matters. It is the threshold between worlds where magic, creativity, and breakthroughs happen…
So what is it?...
“It’s a conversation. A conversation between you and your soul. A conversation between you and your beloved divine voice.”
I was blown away. Here was someone explaining the scientific basis for hearing God’s voice, like it was something everyone knew.
I had only recently realized my gift was ease of access to guidance, not the fact that I received it. But Janet showed me, even more specifically, that my gift is the ease of dropping into theta waves.
Get to Theta However You Can
I, personally, don’t need Morning Pages to hear the voice. I seem to be able to hear at will. Consequently, I didn’t know what to say to help my stepmother 30-odd years ago when she couldn’t hear anything. I just thought she didn’t have the gift.
Now I know that not everyone can hear instantly. And now we all know there’s a workaround. Now we know that Listening for Guidance involves getting your brain to drop into theta waves. And the best way to do that is via Morning Pages.
It’s not the only way, of course. In theory, anything that gets you to theta should work. But I’ll leave those other ways for you to research.
It’s Your Turn
Now it’s your turn to try it. You might want to begin by listening without Morning Pages. If that doesn’t work for you, try it with Morning Pages.
Don’t give up. It might take you days of Morning Pages to get through all the junk in your brain and drop into the theta zone. (Janet Conner says it took her days to get there.)
But getting there will change your life. You’ll find you have a divine presence by your side to encourage and guide you, to walk alongside you, through the challenges of life. What’s not to love about that?
If, after all this, you’re still having a problem, I have one more tip up my sleeve. Stay tuned.
Sharon:
Thank you for sharing this. Your words remind me of some things that I have neglected for a while. I have allowed the challenges of later life to reduce my contemplative time, replacing much of it with frustration with my age related shortcomings. Resentment of life’s flow is very destructive. One can choose to be angry or choose to surrender, and follow that inner voice. I too can immediately commune with that inner voice and with my maker. It is so tragic how often I choose anger and resentment over inner peace. I have several books waiting for me to return to writing them, and many paintings as well.
I just finished writing a Perl program to convert all my 100,000+ photos into a common format while preserving the originals. Naming them all to a common, “date-to-the-second”, naming convention. It has been fascinating watching the process and seeing the past 24+ years of my life, including my various characteristic obsessions over the years.
I grew up accomplishing so much through listening to my inner voice. Time to return to that.
Thanks again.
Gary W. Sherwin