Dear Son,

When I was 12 years old while attending the college assembly, I began to realise that ‘silence’, or absence of sound, is impossible to produce. When the Head Boy marches to the front in assembly and barks that word, like an acne-riddled hormonal sergeant major, he does not surely expect actual silence.

What he really means is relative silence. The cough from that boy in 4C who has a never-ending cold, for one! The scrape of legs on the parquet flooring for another! The Headmaster trotting into the front of the hall! All break this relative silence.

Embracing silence, my dear son, is an art. In fact, it is a lost art for many.

How many of us can embrace or even enjoy the silence in a conversation that has run dry of relevant topics? Do we turn the radio on as soon as we sit in our car? How about exercising with an iPod? I don’t believe any of these realities are inherently bad, but I am discovering that the majority of people in our society aren’t comfortable with silence.

Rather than silence being the default reality, ‘noise’ has become the default.A couple weeks ago I went on a day long silent retreat to a local monastery. I was really looking forward to an exercise of extended silence. Sadly, it seems that it takes something ‘forced’ upon me to slow down long enough to experience such silence.

After an opening briefing by an Elder monk, I entered into my time of complete silence.

To be honest, it was a bit terrifying. Twenty minutes of silence can feel like an eternity, so staring six hours in the face was a daunting prospect.

Further, when left only with the option of self-contemplation, my mind started to dig up stuff that has been buried by daily distraction for a long time. It took the first hour to go through a disciplined inventory evaluation of my heart and mind in an effort to be cantered in silence.

I sensed the need to simply be present, rather than move forward with any agenda or asking.

Although there were a couple of spiritual exercises, the time was spent purely in a place of self-examining silence…and it was hard. It is a discipline that I have far from mastered, but was made aware of the formative place such a discipline should have in my life. My time was blanketed in silence, but it was really loud and was such a stimulating experience.

Is the art of embracing silence something that you have wrestled with? What is it that keeps us from such a discipline? Take half an hour off the daily rituals and get into an isolated corner and turn it into a time of tranquillity. Make this time of quietude an essential part of your day.

It soothes the soul, quiets your inner beast and brings out the goodness in you and allows you to hear yourself.

Yours loving, Thaththi