The Art of Deep Listening evokes awareness, cultivates presence, and develops trust and intimacy!

WHAT HAPPENS IN THE DEEP LISTENING PROCESS?

Deep Listening surfaces and dissolves habitual structures that support cultivating openness for reflective awareness.

WHITE PAPER

All we want is to be heard. With commitment, we become the space where others sort themselves out in language.

—TONY ZAMPELLA

Designer, Deep Listening courses at Bhavana Learning Group

Download our

Listening White Paper

Deep Listening MODEL

Deep Listening begins with a commitment to being with others through
focusing attention, developing intention, and cultivating openness.
 

These FIVE STAGES support cultivating different qualities of awareness to deepen listening.

Click each tab below for descriptions and greater detail.

Increasing Awareness surfaces the reactive, impulsive self.

Level 1: We care about protecting, so we defend, control, and project. 

Focus of Attention: To control events

Listening Dynamic: Win/Lose or avoid losing

Communications: Debate and Defensive

Learning Arc: Discovers reflexive awareness.

Cultivating Attention supports focusing on content for responsiveness.

Level 2: We care about accurately discerning evidence to become better at responding, solving, and informing.

Focus of Attention: To respond to events

Listening Dynamic: Right/Accurate or avoid being wrong

Communications: Discuss and Conform 

Learning Arc: Recognizes and stabilizes grounded awareness.

Develop Intention to predict action.

Level 3: We leverage knowledge via “critical” awareness to predict and anticipate action better.

Focus of Attention: To predict events

Listening Dynamic: Succeed/Fail or avoid failing

Communications: Conversations for Self-Expression and Negotiation

Learning Arc: Develops critical awareness.

Cultivate Meaning to support creating context and connecting.

Level 4: We cultivate deeper understanding by opening, appreciating, and empathizing.

Focus of Attention: To frame experiences that connect and develop mutual understanding

Listening Dynamic: Meaningful/Insignificant or avoid being misunderstood.

Communications: Dialogue and Mutual Understanding 

Learning Arc: Cultivates a relative-relational awareness that becomes reflective

Open Possibilities to co-create.

Level 5: We cultivate openness and relaxed interdependent awareness that finds us receptive, creative, and generating.

Focus of Attention: To create together from the unknown

Listening Dynamic: Whole/Part or avoid binary fragmentation.

Communications: Generate and Co-create 

Learning Arc: Develops spacious, interdependent awareness.

Services

For Coaches. We deliver a complete program to groups of ten coaches or more.

For Clients. We deliver a module of learning for each of the five levels via client workshops.

Contact us for information on coaching services or consulting programs to cultivate Deep Listening.

This course deepened my understanding and perspective on listening
“This class was beautifully designed to start with clarity and build upon what we were learning as we were ready to hear it.  As a coach trainer, I thought I had a pretty good handle on my listening. Going through this course deepened my understanding and perspective on listening in a way that is transforming both how I teach and how I coach.  It’s a challenging course, which makes it all the more valuable.”

Kathy Harman, MCC — Director of Training, Radiance Partners, LLC


I have a plan for mastering Authentic Listening

“Authentic Listening offered me a deeper dive into many of the principles of Ontological Coaching. I have received continuous training in Ontological Coaching for over 15 years, and also have trained and mentored students for 10+ years and still found this course of great value. I now have new practices and ways (language and concepts) to support students and my clients. More than that, I have a plan for mastering Authentic Listening.”

Carol Harris-Fike, NCOC, PCC — Newfield Mentor Coach, Principal of CHF Coaching & Consulting, LLC


The course is rich with concepts and applications.

“The course is rich with concepts and applications. If I had to point to one thing it is the element of keeping participants “on the court” learning and using distinctions. In a world that is crazy fast and that rewards multitasking, this course combined listening concepts with the embodied work necessary to ground ourselves.”

Maureen Gallen, PCC, CPCC — Internal Coach, formerly within the US Department of Homeland Security


The real work and learning took place for me between classes

“I think what made this course so powerful was that much of the real work and learning took place for me between classes when I had time to reflect upon what was coming up for me and in ways that totally surprised me. Throughout the course, I had to sit with my resistance and in doing so, I got a birds-eye view and the experience of how prevalent it is in my life—something I wouldn’t have been able to see and experience had I not taken the course.”

Jan Fielder —  Life Coach, and Workshop Facilitator, Finding Self Compassion


The possibility of deepening my listening…

“I’m speechless, these are master teachers offering a global conversation on listening. It offers the possibility of deepening my listening to support my clients inside a new vision.”

Eric Crowell Founder, Awesome Journey coaching company, Calgary Canada.

The most powerful professional development program I have participated in

“As an ED who has hired training professionals, this program was the most powerful professional development program I have participated in. I learned so much about myself and how much I have developed from my past experiences, even from childhood. Tony and Brendalyn did an amazing job at having us experience the material, reflect, and come back each week to discover ourselves newly. I know I am a different leader, mother, daughter, wife, and friend because of their training. Thank you!”

Analiza Quiroz-WolfExecutive Director, Neighborhood Charter Schools


I now see what the experience of fully being with someone might be

“This course opened my awareness of when I am listening with‚ nothing in between [me and others]‚ and fully present. I learned to listen to others versus listening to my own internal experiences, maps, and chatter. I gained a deeper awareness of observing A LOT of things in the space between me and others. I now see what the experience of fully being with someone might be, and what it is to open the space to allow someone to feel gotten.” “The design of deep intellectual rigor paired with practical application was a rare experience. Thank you.”

Katherine OnoratoLeadership Development Partner, Teach for All


This program was rigorous, well-structured, and gave me access to incredibly useful practices

“Being responsible for Leadership and Learning programs I am seeking out best practices for myself and to share with my team. This program was rigorous, well-structured, and gave me access to incredibly useful practices that I have already started putting in place in my work, in my coaching practice, and in my personal life.”

Radha RuparellHead of Leadership & Learning, Teach For All


Contact us for information on coaching services or consulting programs to cultivate Deep Listening.

We offer this material to support your learning and practice.

BLOGDeep Listening Mindsets Four Part Series

BLOGListening as Context and Practice