Sacred Silences
On Strategies for Finding Peace in a Noisy World
THE WORLD IS NOISY
The modern world is a noisy place and it conditions us to have noisy thoughts. What an unfortunate coincidence, then, that noisy thinking leads to noisy results, like carelessly choosing words in an argument, failing to properly feel your emotions, or living in an environment which is more entropic than it is beautiful.
Many modern mental illnesses are downstream of how noisy the world is and our inability to deal with its volume. It is only natural to feel anxious or overwhelmed when we are bludgeoned with more information on a daily basis than we could ever hope to synthesize.
Thankfully, there is a remedy available: silence.
Silence is a state of surrender, of being at peace with the world and finding a deep contentment rooted in the simple experience of being. Silence helps us heal from noise by bringing us into connection with ourselves and the mystical, enchanted world we inhabit. It is well worth searching for, but the journey requires making a conscious decision to reject the default state of this noisy world. You will need to learn how to filter information and ignore things, like headlines about Donald Trump or the latest celebrity feud, and then actively create spaces in your life for silence to occupy (as I like to say, if you’re not carving reality, it is carving you).
Like any skill in life, this takes effort at first but can become second-nature with practice and repetition. It is possible to learn how to slip into silence at will—subconsciously even—and master the art of finding the pockets of quiet hidden among the noises of the day. By honing these skills, you build a foundation of emotional resilience and calm energy you can draw upon. Developing this wellspring of peace can transform your perspective and presence in the world.
Even more deeply, I value the way my explorations of silence have changed how I connect with others. Silence is like a tuning fork, calling our spirits to vibrate at their natural frequencies. When this occurs, you naturally become more attuned to the resonances that can exist between two people on a deeper level. Connection is sacred.
Here are some practices I’ve had success with in my search for sanctuaries from noise.
NATURE
The natural world is a natural antidote to all the artificial noise we find in cities and suburbia. Whenever my sense of appreciation for how beautiful life is starts to wane, I make sure to go into nature. Being surrounded by its beauty serves as a simple and reliable reminder of things that are good and true. It is like a spiritual grounding. Man belongs in communion with nature, not apart from it. We were created for each other. If we were not, why should our souls feel so pure, so refreshed when we walk between the redwoods, towering and majestic, or gaze upon the dawn’s fog rolling over a hill?
In nature, a man can bring all his thoughts and worries and leave with a lightness of spirit and sense of belonging. It helps to play with different frames of awareness when you are out in the wild. I like to look at the tiny details in leaves, taking in the warm colors, their tree-like veins, and then pull back my focus and marvel at the big picture, seeing the trees as a forest and the forest as a landscape. When I do this, I can actually feel myself integrating in real time, becoming at peace with my place in the world. There is a serenity that occurs when we see things which are bigger than ourselves.
Silence, of course, is not literal here. The burbling of a gentle stream, the chirping melody of birdsongs, the way the wind kisses the leaves of a tree, shaking its branches back and forth in partner dance… a man can hear all these things and still be experiencing silence. Silence is a stillness of the spirit, not the soundwaves.
EXERCISE
Exercise might seem an unexpected strategy for finding silence, what with all the grunting and heavy breathing, but hear me out. If you are having noisy thoughts, you have a problem that is physically located in your head. Exercise gets blood running through your whole body, but especially through your brain. Imagine fresh, healthy blood pumping through your brain, cleaning out your anxieties and worries and all lingering bad thoughts. Don’t you feel closer to silence just thinking about it?
Physical health is a foundation for your mental and spiritual health. You want to be holistic, focused on the big picture, with a process you can enjoy. If you exercise because you hate the way you look, you are doing yourself a spiritual disservice and your practice will not be sustainable (don’t ask me how I know this). Be sure to learn the proper form for whatever exercises you are doing — this might feel more difficult at first, but remember that doing hard things is often easier than doing easy things. Cutting corners on form sets you up for long-term complications that compound and end up being much bigger than the effort you think you are saving by doing something “the easy way.” Learn to listen to your body and trust it.
Most of my life, I hated running. Most of my life, I was a functional alcoholic who was anxious and sad under the surface. When I gave up alcohol, I picked up my legs and started running. The story of my relationship with running and its impact on my life is for another day, but suffice to say running has become one of my favorite activities. When I wake up before dawn and go for a long run in nature, the sense of peace and flow state I get into is second to none. I’m much calmer and happier these days.
READING
Reading is another way to slip away from the noise of the world. There’s a reason people talk about losing themselves in a good book. Great works of writing are consciousness-expanding. When I really get into a book, it feels like I am pouring myself through a looking glass until – pop! – I suddenly find that I am on the other side, seeing a new world through new eyes. When this happens, you start thinking and feeling with a mind that is distinctly not your own. All of the noise from the world you left behind will fade out.
It is a different kind of silence than is found in nature, but these literary out-of-body experiences can be just as profoundly transformative. My own personality and sense of self is little more than an imprint of all the people I’ve met, real and fictional.
We should not take it for granted: literacy is a divine gift. It is literally the key that unlocks the entirety of the human codex. What a blessing to drink from that wellspring of knowledge, to live ten thousand lives and peer—perched on the shoulders of giants—into our dreams, our desires, our past, present, and future.
People don’t believe much in alchemy anymore, but reading the right words at the right time will change your life beyond imagination. Alchemy is the only word.
MUSIC
Music affects me deeply. My favorite songs send powerful reverberations through my soul. Quincy Jones says that “your music will never be more or less than you are a human being.” When you listen to a great song, you fall into a state of deep connection with the person who created it, hearing and feeling their emotions, discovering that there is something universal about the specificity of their individual experiences, and vice versa. Focusing on the story told through song immerses you in a new emotional reality, causing the noise of the default culture to dissolve away.
I think people in the modern world sometimes use music carelessly. Music is extraordinarily powerful, containing more energy than every nuclear reactor in the world combined. If you use it as an ambient soundtrack to your life, a way to “fill in the silence,” you are doing yourself a disservice. Music should be heard, felt, honored.
It should go without saying: music is not the only artistic medium through which you can pursue silence. I just chose it because it’s the one that affects me the most. Cinema, artwork, poetry, photography, live theater… if any of these pull on the strings of your heart, then lean towards that direction in your own pursuit of silence.
SEX
Sex might seem an unexpected strategy for finding silence, what with all the grunting and heavy breathing, but hear me out.
There is no need to elaborate on such a prurient matter or to justify its undeniably positive impact on our sense of well-being. All I have to say is be sure you are doing it with the right person, for the right reasons, and that you treat it as a sacred exchange.
MEDITATION
Meditation is a way to deal with both noise and noisy thinking. I used to meditate a lot more than I do now, but it’s a reliable addition to anyone’s toolbox. The way I do it is pretty simple: I sit upright in a comfortable chair with support for my back, close my eyes, rest my hands facing upright in my lap, and relax my shoulders. I breathe in deeply through my nose, and exhale through my mouth. I try to let my mind go blank; thoughts often pop-up and I sort of gently acknowledge them, then push them away like they’re balloons that I am letting go of. I focus on my breathing. Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale. I do this for 5-15 minutes, always finding myself quite relaxed by the end. That’s when I open my eyes and slip back to reality, feeling calmer and lighter.
Sometimes I’ll do a variation where I imagine I am breathing in pure, healing air with good energy and exhaling bad, toxic air with any pent-up bad energy. Another variation focuses on releasing tension in specific body parts; you might start with the top of your head, then work your way down, slowly, letting each body part feel relaxed and noticing what that feels like before proceeding to the next. You can visualize the good, cleansing energy flowing downwards through your body and being released through your feet into the ground. My favorite variation is to visualize myself meditating somewhere else, like in nature, sitting with my back to a massive redwood tree in a peaceful forest, or at the end of a pier looking out on a glassy lake.
At its heart, meditation is about clearing your mind of noisy thoughts and practicing silence. There’s often a moment early on in a meditation session where I feel frustrated, impatient, like I’m saying to myself, “Hurry up and relax already!” When you sit with that frustration, feel it, then manage to release it and feel the lightness that follows, it both brings us closer to peace and serves as a reminder that we often seek shortcuts in life. We instinctually gravitate towards the path of least resistance in many domains. But sometimes the only way out of a feeling is through it. The only way to achieve greatness is by wading in your own mediocrity for days, weeks, years, and never turning back. Both peace and greatness are on the other side of the storm. Meditation can help you weather it.
A warning: many people preach dedicated meditation as a pathway towards enlightenment. There are more spiritual gurus on Instagram and Twitter claiming—or even just affecting—enlightenment than I could ever hope to ward away. But there is something about the way most of them talk that makes my skin crawl. Maybe it’s how they try to frame the disintegration of their self as a virtuous state, or the holier-than-thou way they talk about their old selves, which often feels like a poorly-disguised proxy for them to project their sense of superiority over everyone else onto.
I think I am against enlightenment. I’d rather stay attached than become detached. I’m comfortable living in the shadow of the great mystery of myself and the world, of everything in between and beyond.
The fog is more beautiful than whatever lies beneath it.
PRAYER
If meditation is a more passive form of creating space for silence or “listening to God,” then prayer is the active form. Prayer is about the earnest, heartfelt expression of desires and sending spiritual goodwill into the world. When I pray, I often ask God to watch over people in my life, especially when I know they are struggling with something. God works through many hands and unexpected pathways, so I try not to create unneeded constraints around the delivery of what I am asking for.
I am in a state of heightened honesty and intentionality when I pray, releasing the purest form of my thoughts and energy.
“In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy.” - Philippians 1:4
Prayer invokes a sense of deep connection with others, and is a way to access both silence and surrender. Surrender means accepting that you are in the ocean, that you do not, that you should not have domain over the currents. Surrender means letting go of our misaligned need to control things. When we stop fighting against the currents of reality, we will often be surprised and delighted to find ourselves ending up exactly where we were meant to.
Prayer is the practice which has most profoundly transformed my life. I began praying before I even believed in God, and it became the pathway which led me towards my faith and some long-overdue spiritual healing. There was a tweet I saw six or so years ago, I think by Sasha Chapin, that read something like, “If you enjoy meditation, you might want to try praying and see how that feels.”
Well, I tried praying, and it felt very, very right. The implications of that feeling set me upon a transformative journey of realignment in my life and towards my faith in God. It’s a funny thing to think about—how different would my reality be today if I hadn’t seen that tweet? 280 characters or less can change the course of your life.
At the end of the day, I am just so grateful. As Doechii says, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude. Lately, my life has felt like it’s in a state of continuous growth and spiritual renewal. I genuinely get a little choked up every time I think about the meaningful connections and friendships I have been making over the past year. It means the world to be able to share myself and my ideas with people who are so kind and curious, and it feels like I am finding a spiritual and intellectual home where I belong with all of you. From the heart, thank you.
SACRED SILENCES
It is only fitting to close with a prayer. Today, I pray that you will find your own sacred silences. If you’re having trouble in your journey, please do not stress; just think about what makes your soul sing and turn towards it. That’s the medium with which you will build your own sanctuary, your own portal for surrendering to joy and wonder.
I know that you will find it.
God be with you and good luck.
“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.
Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.”
- Philippians 4:8-9
Another beautiful piece, Matt. I read each of your sections as a form of meditation, the description of the leaf was mindfulness in itself.
Thank you for sharing
I also used to hate running, but have found a new peace there!