“Silence is an activity, a word, a state of being that has all but lost its meaning in our overstimulated and over media-saturated world.”
Silence is craved but when found it is too often pushed out and replaced or fled from. Even though it is necessary, we deprive Silence of its rightful place in our lives. In truth, Silence scares us humans because it is presence with the Almighty. In true Silence, all is laid bare between us and God. At the same time, the door to our interior lives is unlocked.
It is in Silence of the Mind that distraction is removed, noise put to rest, and busyness settled. Once this occurs introspection can take place and the ability to explore our interiors is at hand. This Silence is much more than not playing music or clearing a calendar to make time to “think.” Thomas Merton believed that “Those who love their own noise are impatient of everything else. They constantly defile the Silence of the forests, of the mountains, and the sea. They bore through silent nature and every direction with their machines, for fear that the world might accuse them of their own emptiness (No Man Is an Island).” When we fail to take an honest look at ourselves, to orient ourselves to something outside of ourselves we are at risk of slowly dying. By boring through nature in every direction, we reject God’s invitation to Him. In Silence of the Mind, we prepare ourselves for a Silence of the Heart, in other words, we must look inward before we can look to the Heavens.