Silence

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This is something I published on 1/5/22. Heads up – you may have already read this.

Yesterday, the first full day that both of my kids were back at school, I just sat in my empty house in silence. No tv or music, my cell phone turned to vibrate, computer off. Just the hum of the refrigerator and the sound of the rain on the window. It felt like a whole day’s worth of restoration and calm although I only sat like that for about 15 minutes.

I was under the influence of a great On Being podcast I listened to: Silence and the Presence of Everything. In it, Krista Tippet was interviewing acoustic ecologist and silence activist Gordon Hempton. He had so many powerful things to say about the experience of silence. To recap a few:

  • Our ears are always working. The reason alarm clocks are effective is because while our brain sleeps, our ears never do.
  • There are some animal species that are blind – creatures that live deep in caves or in the depths of the ocean. But all higher vertebrates have a sense of hearing. It’s too dangerous to live without. We have eyelids but nothing has ear lids.
  • Research shows that in noisy areas people are less likely to help each other.

He expanded on the last point. When we speak in a quiet place, the listener can hear both our words and our tone. Noisy places are isolating, we aren’t ever sure we are getting all the information that we need from our environment to make our nervous systems know we are safe. Listening enables our sense of security and bolsters a feeling of intimacy. Quiet places like churches and concert halls are where we feel secure, where we can open and be receptive.

A story that I recently read about Evelyn Glennie, a gifted percussionist who is profoundly deaf makes me realize that silence and sound can be equally present for those whose ears do and do not work. Because she works with the vibrations that come with noise, she feels sound in a way that we all do whether or not we’ve developed the awareness.

When my first child was about 6 months old a friend asked me whether having kids was noisy. My answer at the time was “no.” My experience was that there was so much beauty in all the silent moments listening for the sound of my baby waking. Still now, my favorite moments are the quiet ones – hiking in the woods together, the moments we quietly play with Legos when the little one is napping and the times I try to move noiselessly around the house so that I can meditate and write without waking anyone. There is such intimacy when we are listening for each other.

Last summer I was sitting on the porch of a creaky old cabin a block off the beach of Mutiny Bay on Whidbey Island. I’d snuck out of a bed that I was sharing with my daughter for our 2 nights there and through all the rattling doors with a hot cup of tea and sat to meditate. As I sat there, I heard a whale exhale through its blow hole and looked up. I barely caught a glimpse of three whales in the sliver of bay 150 yards away that I could see between the two buildings in front of me. But I heard the distinctly unique sound several more times through the quiet morning air before the whales moved on. It was exhilarating and intimate.

After recently reading Jane Fritz’s post celebrating World Introvert Day, I may be more of an introvert than I previously realized given how much recharge I get from being alone. But quiet is good for us all. Or as Gordon Hempton says, “Quiet is quieting.”

Do you have favorite silent places? Sounds that you can only hear when life is quiet?

I’ve also published a post today on Wise & Shine: Unlikely Learning Mates.

62 thoughts on “Silence”

  1. Pingback: Unlikely Learning Mates - Wise & Shine

  3. It’s interesting to revisit this post as we look ahead to the return to school in a few weeks – summer just flew by.

    Silence is such a gift in itself and as you said so restorative and I do crave it. I love my T but he is so loud and noisy that the moments he’s at camp or at school – or when I am on my 1 hour bus and subway ride to and from work feels like a gift.

    I also think this is why I gravitate towards the outdoors and it’s vast soothing silence and sounds of nature.

    Liked by 4 people

    1. I totally hear you about the loud and noisy that comes with our delightful ones. Great point about the outdoors – as you said so well – vast and so soothing! Hope you all are enjoying this wind down of summer.

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  4. I libe alone, and work in a mostly empty office, so when I’m home I turn the TV on for companionship to hear the sound of voices. I love when my family makes the 3 hour drive up to the city, where they camp out in my 1 bedroom apartment. Maybe because there’s so many in a small space, but I enjoy the quiet again after they have left our delightful visit together!

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    1. I love this. Your “turn the TV on for companionship” sentiment makes me smile. When I lived in a ghostly quiet apartment complex in rural Japan, the nighttime quietude was overwhelming; thus, when a friend came to visit, I absolutely relished the sound of his snoring. Several times, he apologized for his snoring; each time, I said, “I LOVE it! Signs of life. Music to my ears.” 🙂

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      1. Ah, you get it! Yes, I love my family dearly, but in a small apartment boisterous teens don’t have a lot of space! It was different when I lived in my daughter’s house, I had my own room!

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  5. Silence is so restorative after being surrounded by sound and full on noise all the time. I think our brains learn how to block out a lot of the background but that also means we really aren’t completely turned off- we know that background hum is there and can escalate at any time. It seems to take greater effort to find real, profound silence.

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    1. I love this comment, Deb. You are right, we aren’t completely turned off. And finding profound silence – what a beautiful experience to seek!

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  6. This post evokes so many thoughts, feelings, and memories for me!

    I have very profound sound sensitivities. My weeks with my kids, who manage to make even typically quiet endeavors noisy, I almost constantly wear my noise-canceling headphones to have strong “signal” (v. layers of noise from every direction) on which to focus; my meditations are to the music of Isakov with the Colorado Symphony. My weeks without my kids, I meditate with earphones off and can stay within my window.

    Your mention of whales got me all, ❤ ❤ <3. One of my most magically quiet mornings was researching killer whales on a cliff overlooking the Johnstone Strait. In the deep quietude of a foggy morning on which my fellow research assistants were at a party some hike away on the island, I enjoyed a quiet call with a sibling when I went, "Wait, one sec–I think I'm hearing something?" I stopped, listened, and–sure enough!–heard the telltale exhalation through a blowhole and said, "Gotta run! I had no indication from other lookouts that whales were near, but they are, and I gotta observe." Moments after, I got to see a still-orange newborn calf nurse from her mom in the water maybe 40 feet beneath my duct-taped shoes. It was so incredible to experience, I have goosebumps to remember it a couple decades later.

    From that cliff, I could also see a place–the Rubbing Beaches–where the whales would rub their bellies against pebbles and utter what sounded like cries of delight. I loved, loved, loved the sound of it, and loved how it took me back to one of the articles that led me to being a research assistant there in the first place. As I there watched and listened, I could also feel/hear the echoes of all the love emanating from that article, which talked about the joy of experiencing the whales' joy in these pebble-rubbing moments.

    What a gift, to get to contemplate allllll this, this morning. ❤

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    1. Oh my goodness, I’m laughing (a knowing kind of laughter) about this wonderful description, “my kids, who manage to make even typically quiet endeavors noisy,” Yes, yes, yes!!

      And your Johnstone Strait experience – how incredibly wonderful! I knew I’d heard that strait name so I looked it up, what a beautiful place in the world, first of all. Secondly – what an incredible experience!! Wow wow wow!! Thank you so much for this beautiful and delicious description of a sacred encounter!!

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  11. “So if you are too tired to speak, sit next to me for I, too, am fluent in silence.”
    ― R. Arnold
    Early morning silence before dawn sitting with a cup of tea on my sofa near the balcony ,and observing every moment how the life wakes up to another day is what makes me feel more connected to myself and to all beings .

    I love your posts a fulfillment to heart and soul ❤️

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  15. I love silence too, although my quiet places aren’t exactly quiet. My morning walks in the desert at dawn are filled with sounds of birds. At the beach, I love to sit quietly on the beach and watch and listen to waves.

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  16. Wynne, I love this! It’s funny because I’ve been thinking a lot about silence lately. I’m seeking it, consciously, in a life that sometimes feels full of noise and busyness. But there are moments, quiet moments when I sit in the hammock under this gracious willow tree to watch a sunset, feel intense gratitude and an intangible connection with the divine. It’s not every day, but those 10 or 15 minutes make an enormous difference to my world.
    I love your story about the whales. What a blessed experience.

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    1. This sentence is so beautiful, Alegria, “But there are moments, quiet moments when I sit in the hammock under this gracious willow tree to watch a sunset, feel intense gratitude and an intangible connection with the divine. It’s not every day, but those 10 or 15 minutes make an enormous difference to my world.” Wow wow wow! Incredible. Thank you for sharing that scene – it makes me feel good just reading it.

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  19. Here’s to us Introverts. Introverts unite. I get the need for silent spots. The perfect space is important, but what seems to matter most is noise, as in the right soft music or white noise that lets my thoughts roam and allows me to be the most productive!

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    1. Wow, Brian, I love this statement, “what seems to matter most is noise, as in the right soft music or white noise that lets my thoughts roam and allows me to be the most productive!” That is really profound. Maybe we need a whole post on that!

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  20. My favorite quiet spots are far from silent….my living room chair with my coffee in the predawn hours of the morning is accompanied by the bird chorus, traffic on the distant highway, my animals snoring or swearing at each other. The seat of my kayak on a glassy lake is filled with the dip of the paddle against the water, fish jumping, and birds twittering.

    Now that my children are grown and flown the nest, my house is mostly quiet. I rarely have on a radio or tv. At work the radio is always on and there is constant people around, so my home is my quiet haven. While they were growing, my mornings were my quiet time to refresh and recharge before the day began.

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  23. When I read the words “silence activist” my mind immediately went to a Get Smart episode, “Spy, Spy, Birdie,” in which the villain is a Mister Pfister (the “p” is silent) who believes the world is destroying itself with sounds. Of course, his illogical counter is to destroy it himself with “silent” explosions. Another of his notable inventions is a vinyl record that plays 30 minutes of “golden silence.” XD

    More relevant to the point, I love your observation: “There is such intimacy when we are listening for each other.” As someone who is sensitive to noise, particularly in the mornings, I have found myself tending to be quiet and aware of other people in the house. Not to say it came naturally, but I got lots of practice growing up because my mom was a nurse and would often sleep during the day after a night shift. As I’ve practiced more conscious listening/being quieter myself, I’ve come to appreciate it and also love it when others do the same for me! And who hasn’t been able to tell which of their family members is coming down the stairs or walking on the floor above us just by the way their footfalls sound? It is indeed a mark of intimacy.

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    1. What a funny episode getting to a similar point about quiet with some interesting “inventions.” Interesting!

      And I love the intimacy you describe of knowing other’s footfalls. Those moments when we know each other with our hearts. Absolutely beautiful – thanks for adding this wonderful example.

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