Cornerstones of Heart-Centered Communication
July 2024 – Feb 2025
The classes in this series include:
- Listening with Empathy
- The Power of Observation
- Emotions as a Doorway to Deeper Connection
- Nourishing Life-Affirming Needs
- Compassionate Self-Empathy
- Making Clear Requests
- Cornerstones Wrap-Up
Class Descriptions
The Power of Observation
with Nura Lora Laird
We human beings have many veils, 70,000 of them according to the Qur’an. Sidi says in the first station of the nafs in Music of the Soul (p 47), “This word (nafs) contains all the things that come from your self – your perception, your hearing, your feeling, the voices in your mind, and the desires of your heart.” In other words, our nafs is influenced by many veils, leading to distorted perceptions of what’s happening to us and misunderstandings in our conversations. These distortions are called “interpretations.”
In this class we discover the crucial difference between observations, which are objective perceptions of what happened, and our interpretations or our stories about what happened. These are often vastly different, leading to misunderstandings and breakdowns in relationships. Shifting from interpretations to observations helps all parties to clarify what happened and to get on the same page, re-establishing their connection and love, insha’allah.
Emotions as a Doorway to Deeper Connection
with Ruhayyah Andrea Ferrante
Emotions are an aspect of our humanity created by Allah, and they have purpose and meaning as does all of creation. Join us as we explore the gifts and responsibilities of our capacity to feel. We will identify the range and literacy of emotion, as well as how to discern thinking from feeling. As we become conscious and aware of our emotional nature, we are more able to know and understand our inner experience, and from there help others to know and understand us. Uncovering how emotions serve connection, as well as understanding how they operate in human relationships is powerful, especially when we link our emotions to our deeper, life-serving needs and values. Join us in celebration as we explore the beauty and depth Allah creates in our lives through the stream of emotion, and what can shift as we establish our ability to witness and respond to life consciously.
Nourishing Life Affirming Needs
with Mahabbah Young
The experience of being human includes having needs, longings, and aspirations arise within that are wanting our attention. They are natural, like emotions, and almost all of them are intrinsic, or intangible. Food and water are basic needs for survival; however, beyond that a need may be for meaning, choice, learning, inclusion, honesty, etc. In this series of classes we will explore the vast world of needs and how we can become more aware of them in our own selves and in others. We will also notice what may support nourishment or fulfillment of needs and the connection of living needs to our relationship with God.
Integration and Practice of Empathy, Observation, Emotions, and Needs
with Mahabbah Young, Ruhayyah Ferrante, and Nura Laird
Allah created humans with a capacity for deep empathy and presence, to be observers of life , to feel and to need. As we come to know ourselves and one another, we come to know our Lord. Please join Nura Laird, Mahabbah Young and Ruhayyah Ferrante for an overview and opportunity for integration of the heart-centered restorative skills that have been taught to date. There will be time for review, practice, questions, and discussion on how to apply these skills. Our practice time will focus on listening and reflecting what we hear in order to open our connection, understanding, and be more present.
Note: This class will be 2 hours to allow time for discussion and questions after we practice. This will be the only class in November.
Compassionate Self-Empathy
with Ruhayyah Ferrante
One of the main blessings we come to know on the Sufi path is the blessing of coming to know ourselves. In our way, Allah asks us to come to know ourselves so that we can know our Creator more deeply. In this class on self empathy, we pull together many of the practices in this series we have learned so far and dive inward to accompany our own being through life experiences.
Whether Allah is creating ease or difficulty it serves our being to be present to what is moving within at any time in life. We are the ones who are always present to the life we are given. If we can bring this presence to an experience and let it unfold within, unpacking the thinking, the emotions, and the needs/longings and aspirations, we are much more connected to the One who is sending the experience to us.
If you tend to be hard on yourself, the basis of the practice is empathy as we witness what arises for ourselves with curiosity, wonder, and friendship.
Come explore and discover what is behind and behind and under the layers of experience. Notice what stops forward movement and what supports forward movement. Notice what is living within us in a more conscious, caring, and responsive way. Come to understand more deeply or recognize more meaning that Allah is making for you through the experience.
Much like self healings, self-empathy is a pathway for connecting with The Real and receiving next steps or resolving something we have yet to resolve on our own. Both within and beyond our own interpretations, judgements, emotion, and needs we are transported to new discovery and meaning within our relationship; with God, others, and ourselves.
If you are looking for more self care, love, empathy and compassion this may be a practice you want in your toolbox.
Handouts
Making Clear Requests
with Nura Laird
Insha’allah, we intend to examine making requests both in how we are in relationship with Allah and how we are in relationship with the world. In our lives with Allah, we pray with different intentions, but mostly we pray because we’re asking Allah for something that we desire or wish for. What’s really going on in these prayers? Are we requesting something of Allah, or are we demanding something of Allah? Behind our prayers we are often demanding Allah to do what we want. What is the nature of our relationship with Allah? Is it transactional? And where is our surrender in that? The last thing we want is to make demands of Allah.
In our everyday lives we are often preoccupied with what we want or don’t want to happen. How do these desires live inside us? Are they requests or demands? One thing that causes difficulty in our lives is the common tendency to demand that things be the way we want.
When we make requests, we’re prepared to accept a “yes” or “no” response from another person. We’re ok with any response. For example, you ask someone, “Would you be willing to save the last piece of cake for me?” If yes, you’re pleased; if no, you’re still ok, and your relationship with that person is unchanged.
Demands are wishes or desires in which we don’t accept “no.” “Would you be willing to save the last piece of cake for me?” We expect “yes;” the answer has to be “yes.” There’s no space for a “no.”
It can be difficult to distinguish between a request and a demand. However, the difference is significant and consequential. They usually sound different, they’re rooted in different intentions, and they usually have different outcomes. Demands often lead to challenge, push back, conflict; requests often lead to a positive response or at least open the door for discussion with another.
We often aren’t conscious that we’re making a demand. We think we’re being polite. It depends on the intention of the person speaking. For example, “I need you to be quiet; I’m trying to concentrate.” This could be a polite request, satisfied with a “no.” Usually, however, this statement is a demand; the other person is expected to be quiet, and if not, it affects the interaction inn that moment and even can affect the relationship.
We Sufis often talk about “being in the polite.” What does this really mean? Generally, requests are polite and demands often are not. Some requests are really demands in disguise.
Join us as we explore the significant difference between requests and demands, and what is likely to happen when we make requests or when we make demands. Learn how to transform your demands into requests. This switch could significantly alter all your relationships, including your relationship with Allah.
Cornerstones of Heart-Centered Healing Wrap-Up
with Mahabbah Young and Nura Laird
This week will focus on bringing together everything we’ve learned during the Cornerstones of Heart-Centered Communication series. There will be ample time for questions and time for practice.
Helpful Links
PROGRAMS
- Cornerstones of Heart-Centered Communications
- Transform your Stories to Embrace Truth and Freedom
- Navigating Power Dynamics with Courage, Honesty, and Heart
REGISTER FOR RECORDINGS