Our Relationship with Silence

Silence is a shared phenomenon; we all know something of what it is. In silence, it is possible to experience the spacious timelessness that weaves itself around sounds and vibrations, and between moments, movements and occurrences. Silence is an ever-present friend during times of stillness and transition - silence is the one who embraces us in the here and now, and walks with the solitary traveller. For some, particularly the Quakers, whose formal practice is to sit together and enter into 'silent worship', silence is a religious experience. For Buddhists also, 'noble' and 'thundering' silence is an essential quality that presents itself through the Dharma.

Most of the known universe is understood to be a silent vacuum. A deep and quiet space enfolds our Mother Earth and emerges through her life-breath; silence lingers in the breeze, which we take refuge in with each breath. Silence beholds a wordless profundity, pupil-to-pupil, between friends and lovers, and silence caresses the curled locks of a sleeping child.

Silence offers us a looking glass that frames the light and shadow of our tempestuous psyche in which, aspirations, emotions and insights may ricochet into being. Why then do we avert our gaze from our reflection? We may spend our lives hiding behind theatrical masks, and dramatic scripts to play, rehearse and ruminate. So often, instead of standing vulnerably and open to the continuing renewal of silence, we cower idly in the spirits of another time and another place. A little ferment may stimulate digestion, yet we binge on the stagnation of our minds, with no moderation. We overconsume the bottled tonic of our suffering, rather than refresh ourselves by sipping the silence collected in the calm pool at the fountain of well-being.

Sometimes there are suffocating moments in our lives when the joy of silence is out of our awareness. We do not notice the clock tick or the singing bird in conversation with our heartbeat. There is just 'the world', and it crushes all breath from our chest, and we believe that silence is not worth the listening. Words are ashen and cold and contain none of the burning embers of heart and soul. In these cases, there is no relationship with silence, no fire in the belly, just a poison steadily seeping through the organs and numbing the mind.

It can seem like a hard slog to confront ourselves in meditation, wherein silence contains the conditions for exquisite and piercing insight, through the numbness. Journeying over the quiet road interconnecting all things is a spiritual challenge; silence is a whole universe to brave and explore. Otherworldly guardians stand at the gates of silence - they are named fear and insecurity. Only by paying the guardians the respects that they are due, and not a penny too much or too little, will one then be able to pass through.

Re-joining silence is not like entering a chasm or void. The abyss is only in our experience when we separate our minds from silence. Like any good friend, silence will warmly accommodate us. Looking deeply, we may see that silence is the companion who lives with us at home. Fear and insecurity had a right to guard our home while we were away, and now when we return home to live with silence, we may relax again.

Each moment that we sit and experience silence, we may reunite with the unconscious parts of ourselves. We come home to the young boy or girl who has missed us, care for the wounds of only last year, and pick up the broken and scattered pieces of our hearts that have fallen. We sweep the floors, wash the walls and the windows, and let the airflow into our souls. We weed the borders, water the flowers and sculpt our gardens with increasing verve and creativity. Silence works there alongside us, and we are in love with silence, we realise silence is our beloved friend.

There is a common choice that we all have. It concerns how we engage with life and whether we engage with the dimension of silence at all. When we are disconnected from silence, we voraciously strive to fill the abyss we feel in that separation. The separation whets an unending appetite for something to connect with again. This often manifests through scrolling through social media feeds, escaping into the pages of a book, empty verbal exchanges about the weather, sex, video games, alcohol, pharmaceutical drugs and self-medication. We search for something that will replace the energy we have lost through forgetting silence.

We may regain our sense of wholeness through silence, for it is the realm of the Soul. Thoughts, words and actions emerge effervescently from the soul, yet so little do we reflect on and observe the origins of these parts of us. Our attention becomes knotted and depleted in the activities of the mind, and we forget how to free ourselves.

Simply observing silence gives us a healing space between thinking, speaking and doing. Silence does not eradicate any of the necessary activities that we must complete in our daily lives, and nor does it provide an escape from suffering. No, when we partner with silence, we learn to encounter what needs to be done with the attention that it deserves. We drop our restless searching and spend more time accepting what is. We live fully. A conscious relationship with silence illuminates our thinking, purifies our speech, and refines our actions.

We can silently pause between passages in a book and slowly re-read what moved us. We may read the same lines once, twice, three, maybe four times. This is Lectio Divina; we allow the words to sink in and behold them with a quiet mind so that their light may shine through. Then the words can nourish us and open us to the beauty of life, instead of keeping us locked into their forms.

Silence allows us to witness the person that we are becoming and empowers us to shape and change how we engage our minds and give meaning to reality. There is a silent way to work, cook, garden, write, dance, sing and make love. First, we must notice that silence is there within us, and it becomes our reference point, our refuge, our home and our anchor. We silently observe our breathing, our heartbeat, the resonating strings on a violin, the posture of our body, the tapping of our digits, and we come back to ourselves. We may listen to our heart's expression arising in us before we speak and put into words the true essence of what we wish to convey. Silence refreshes us and relieves us from running on habitual thought patterns. It calms the mindless chatter and gives us a clean opportunity to alter the message that we cultivate for ourselves and for the world.

When thoughts arise in silence, they are like plasticine that can be moulded and shaped with our loving attention. With no regard for silence, thoughts lose their elasticity and energy, and ideas harden, splinter and cause unnecessary suffering. When we are suffering, it serves us well to pause for silence. Whether we choose to experience it for seconds, hours, months or a lifetime, silence will enrich us with the many gifts of self-reflection. Whether we engage with silence or not is a constant choice that we are making every moment.