The following talk was given at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California.

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Warm greetings from IMC Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City.

And then delighted to be here with you all.

Many years ago, a good number of years ago, I met a woman who had a career as being a psychologist

and when she was younger, she had done research on early childhood development.

And her research involved, for a couple of years, involved once a week or so, going to visit a new mother

and who was kind of at home taking care of this new child, baby and toddler and so forth.

And for two years, the researcher went and just sat in the living room quietly,

didn't have any conversations with the mom and just watched and took notes on the child

and mother interactions and what happened as part of her study.

So after two years of doing this, it was time for the researchers to stop that part of the study

and then announced that she was leaving or something.

And the researcher was stunned to hear what the mother had to say.

She hadn't said anything. They hadn't had conversations.

I guess the researchers meant to have been kind of a non-interfering observer of it all.

And the mother said that the few hours that the researcher spends with them were the most important hours of the week for her.

And she felt so much peace. She felt so much sense of well-being, just having someone in her presence watching.

And I don't have much more to story to say.

The context of why it might have been so profound for the mother.

Certainly the mother sometimes feel isolated in the challenging of raising a child.

But the power of presence, power of observing, the power of listening to people is quite profound.

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