Are you afraid of silence?

Action is seductive.

When we’re in high-action mode, a torrent of adrenaline runs through our bodies. This high-octane fuel keeps us moving forward.

There’s no time for reflection, only forward momentum, production, outcomes and making it happen.

If we don’t take action, nothing will happen.

Is that true?

Action does produce results, but when you stop—between meetings or tasks—to take a breath, what are you aware of?

Can you be still without getting restless, without feeling like the train’s leaving the station without you? Without feeling like you’re missing out or falling short?

Stillness can be terrifying. Especially to the mind that conflates multi-tasking with meaning and staying-busy with being whole-hearted. That’s the mind that keeps you busy. Setting goals. Going to meetings. Checking off the items on your list. It feels good—in an adrenaline-y kind of way. You’re movin’ and groovin’.

It’s wonderful to flex your creative muscles and make stuff happen—but, it’s also wonderful to let go of needing to do anything, of needing to prove anything. It’s wonderful to make things happen and also to let go of pushing yourself and other people to fit your idea of “better.”

It’s valuable to just be still and discover what’s really moving you—which will likely be a bundle of mixed motivation.
If you’re like me (and every person I’ve ever worked with) what you find just below the surface of all your activity is a bundle of mixed motivations.

When you first settle down and listen inside mindfully, you’ll likely discover a chorus of voices urging you to run in a hundred different directions. Each voice has its own point of view, its own imperative and its own urgent demand.

Each voice is fixated on its own survival. Each is committed to the perpetuation of its own history.

When I listen inside to the chorus, I can hear the voices of:

Ambition
Self-doubt
Competition
Service
Creativity
Care
Confusion
And more…

The cacophony of voices fragments attention. And when attention fragments, it becomes impossible to discern what truly matters; to connect with that core impulse that will both heal the wounded voices and bring them all into a deeper unity. This healing and unification can only be discovered in silence.

But how can we find silence, when the voices keep shouting and lobbying for their disparate agendas?

This is where meditation becomes so valuable. Through the practice of meditation, you discover a silence that is deeper than the discordant voices. Through the practice of meditation, you enter this silence where you can hear the unifying note—the primal tone of your soul.

You don’t have to silence the voices to enter this healing silence. Rather than struggle against the voices, you attune to that which is deeper and already present. This is the paradox of meditative practice. Through doing the practice, you discover a silence that is ever-present.

You don’t create this silence. You don’t make it happen. You open to it—you rest into it. Even as you read these words, you can feel that silence surrounding and inter-penetrating every level of your being.

The relationship of this deep silence to the voices is like that of clouds and sky—the presence of clouds can never disturb the sky. The sky remains open, unbounded and ever-present when clouds are thick or thin. The sky doesn’t need to get rid of clouds to become more sky-like. It’s the same with silence.

In deep silence, conflicts and tensions dissolve.

In meditative awareness, inner conflicts aren’t solved, they’re dissolved.

In the silence, it’s all so simple. You “hear” what’s true—for you and for your life.

You attune to innate wisdom, which is unerring and trustworthy—which is not say that all the voices will agree with innate wisdom. They often won’t. Which is why the spiritual life is a practice. Breath by breath. Moment to moment.

Communing with silence isn’t an item on the to-do list. Allowing silence to breathe you into action is a life-long practice. You can’t check it off as “done.” Awakening is not an event that happens to you—it’s a process that happens through you and as you. It’s the ongoing blessing of noticing when you’re lost in the cacophony of voices and hustling rather than being whole-hearted. And then—you have the opportunity to take another breath, and let the silence guide you deeper and deeper into your True Life.

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Author: Eric Klein

Editor: Yoli Ramazzina

Photo: original illustration by the author.