The healing power of listening in silence
For centuries we have largely ignored the wisdom of those of us who are still directly connected to ancestral ways of knowing. As our modern lifestyles collide with our Earth’s inability to support our current way of life, we are finally beginning to look to those who once lived in a state of indefinite sustainability and abundance for a way forward.
“To have a sustainable community, you have to make sure the people are sustainable. This means healing trauma.”
– Jarmbi Githabul, Narakwal / Githabul keeper
What is Dadirri?
“Dadirri is inner, listening deeply and silent, still aware. Dadirri recognizes the deep source within us. We call upon it and it calls upon us. This is the gift Australia longs for. It’s like what you call ‘contemplation’.”
– Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr-Baumann, Ngangiwumirr elder
Then Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr-Baumann speaks
from dadirri she speaks of a form of deep, contemplative listening that is nothing less than a personal spiritual practice. This type of silent listening is well known throughout the Australian continent, in many language groups under many names. “When I experience dadirri, I become whole again.” Mirjam describes. “I can sit on the riverbank or walk through the trees; even if someone close to me has died, I can find my peace in this silent consciousness. No words are needed. A big part of dadirri is listening.”
Learn and heal by listening
According to Ungunmerr-Baumann, learning from a very young age is about waiting and listening; don’t ask questions. In a culture where everyone is so well practiced at listening that it has become a spiritual art, it makes sense that when trauma occurs, people come together and listen deeply to each other. For this reason, dadirri also refers to a form of group trauma healing that brings the deep presence of dadirri’s solo practice to a group setting. Details about dadirri as a group practice can be found in Prof. Judy Atkinson’s book Trauma marks, recreating song lines. The essence of dadirri, in this broader context, is to create a space of deeply contemplative, heart-based listening where stories of trauma and pain can be shared and seen with loving acceptance.
In my own experiences with Indigenous Australians who are deeply connected to the land, I have felt that they are so grounded that it is almost as if the land itself is listening to you, through them.
“Healing the land heals ourselves, and healing ourselves heals the land.”
– Prof. Judy Atkinson – Jiman/Bunjalung woman, author of Trauma marks, recreating song lines
Emotional completion
According to Prof. Stan Grof, trauma healing comes from finally emotionally completing an experience that may have been physically completed a long time ago. The first moment of pain may have become so overwhelming that we unconsciously decide to ‘check out’; in other words, we dissociate emotionally. Every part of us screams, “Stop, I don’t want to feel this!” The problem is that we don’t stop the emotional experience, we just press pause.
When we don’t have the courage or the skills (because we’re too young or never learned) to actually feel all the emotions of a traumatic experience, we inadvertently capture and store the part of it that we can’t handle. away for later. Dadirri is a practice that allows us to open this trapped pain and trauma into a sacred and held space and with the support of those around us we can finally feel it so it can be released.
“Trauma puts you in a powerless position that makes you easily influenced. It hinders your ability to make clear decisions for yourself.”
– Jarmbi Githabul, Narakwal / Githabul keeper
The importance of a practice like dadirri is that it is completely based on non-judgment. Over time, the story is shared multiple times, and as a result, the telling begins to change. The emotional charge is released little by little as the circle around them offers an unwavering reflection of loving acceptance. Very often the person who has suffered a trauma begins to adopt this attitude of loving acceptance towards themselves.
Limbic resonance and revision
The reason this works, from a neuroscience perspective, is because of: limbic resonance, mirror neurons, and neuroplasticity. The understanding of limbic resonance
claims that without consistent love and acceptance during childhood, our brains do not develop properly. The part that gets delayed developmentally is our resilience to emotional problems. Similar problems can occur in people of all ages when they experience trauma. The process of limbic revision is about rewiring the neural structure of a person who has suffered trauma or emotional neglect; For this to happen, there must be an external example that the limbic brain can mimic.
Deep, respectful, contemplative, heart-based listening, based on loving acceptance rather than judgment, may be the optimal reflection that a traumatized limbic system can use as a model for restructuring. Mirror neurons
see this outward, compassionate reflection and fire inward in the same way; and neurons that fire together connect to each other. With a little repetition, neural rewiring takes place (thanks neuroplasticity) that provides a neurological explanation for why dadirri is good for helping people who have suffered trauma.
I think we are fortunate that we live in a time where, whether we are Indigenous or non-Indigenous, we are awakening. We recognize the similarities between ancient and modern ways of healing ourselves, and thereby discover the techniques that really work.