10 Ways to Embrace the Power of Silence

"Let your beauty manifest itself without talking or calculation.

You are silent.

It says for you: I am.

And comes in meaning thousand fold,

comes at long last over everyone."

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

From the moment we rise in the morning, we are engulfed in external noise – the alarm clock buzzing, music blaring, coffee pot beeping. We live our lives amidst noise everywhere, and some of the most pressing and stressing sounds are the ones we live with internally. Our minds are filled with woven thoughts – always one after the next. The external commotion of our environment combined with the inner chatter of the mind leaves little room for us to truly experience silence.

But I think we can all agree that silence is a virtue, universally. It is as old as time. Before the world succumbed to the creation and bombardment of man-made sounds, the Universe was a vast, open space – where the only echoes you hear are tranquility and stillness. The beauty of silence is that it simply “is”. There is nothing artificial or engineered about it. Silence offers an opening that cannot be immediately defined -- an opportunity to take the time to unearth the mysteries and lessons that exist within.

Silence, however, does not come naturally for most of us. Especially in a modern today. We instinctively feel uneasy when there is an unexpected pause in a flow of action or motion. We have the uncomfortable habit of filling silent gaps with superficial talk. Or, we purposely avoid situations where noise is absent. We inherently fear it, as if one must develop an “acquired taste” to silence, or gain a special set of skills to learn to tolerate it.

It forces me to wonder: Is making room for silence an impossible feat to achieve in our modern, techno-noisy society? And if so, are we missing the whisper and unforeseen magic that the Universe and Self may be trying to communicate to us?

In the midst of all the noise, silence is remarkably easy to find; it’s everywhere around us. We should learn to unmask the noise by deliberating and consciously making an effort to create silence. In so doing, we can help remove tension and anxiety from our environment, recharge our internal batteries, and create peace with ourselves and our surroundings.

We should celebrate the beauty of certain sounds, such as the cries of a newborn baby or in the art of creating music. Nevertheless, we must make it a ritual to quiet the external noise and let the sounds of nature – Mother Earth’s music – emerge and sing to us. And we can begin to realize in its power, that it is healing, spiritual, and divine. Also, within the silence lies an offering to hear ourselves, attune to our own inner voice.