Hi folks, how are you doing? This week we will meet at the Enigma Tap from 7.30. I hope you will be able to join us.
This week we are going to think about a subject that’s very close to my heart………… Silence!
Those who know me, will recognise that I generally don’t do silence, in fact as I write this I have some very loud music on in the background.
Anyway, as some of you know I have upped the amount of time I spend reading, last week I found myself sitting on our sofa in silence, reading, yeah, I know… silence and reading! What has happened to Rob!?
This also corresponded with a friend’s post on facebook about a book by Susan Cain titled Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a world that can’t stop talking. A couple of folks from BFX have got it, or have read it.
Before we get into it why not check out the youtube link: 433 By John Cage is a performance piece of silence, first done by him in 1955. it has been performed all over the world in all kinds of circumstances some of them very casual some of them
The conversation on facebook led to someone talking about a film they had discovered called ‘The Pursuit of Silence’. You can find it on various streaming channels and there is a youtube link as well. I thought I would watch it with the view of writing a reflection on it, so here it is.
It’s really beautifully filmed, and gives moments of silence within it, I found myself catching my breath several times as I was hooked into it. After a few images and a slow quiet start it begins with a young man, Greg Hindy who decided to walk across the United States, with a vow of silence… he communicates using cards to write on… What is interesting is that he wasn’t really sure why he was doing it, although he says “i have this feeling that it has a lot of potential to be something, be something really meaningful for me and hopefully for other people”.
The film pauses at various points with a mix of silence interspersed by various academics, theologians and others, reflecting on silence. Towards the start it looks at the concepts of silence, is it a decibel sense or noise sense, or lack of noise, according to DR. Helen Lees, she suggests that literature suggests silence is not necessarily about ‘noise’. So if that is the case what is it? There are two words at the core of the word silence:
“anastagon and then decinary one of them has to do with the wind dying down and the other has to do with a kind of stopping of motion they’re both to do with an interruption, not just of sound, but… are also due to… the interruption of the imposition of our own egos on the world.”
There were a few other ideas that made me ponder and so I wrote them down… Here are a few quotes from the film.
“we lose a lot when we don’t allow people and not just allow but encourage people to go off by themselves you know whether literally into the woods or metaphorically to just go and start your own journey and do it by yourself and there are certain paths in this life that you’ve gotta walk alone and that’s the only way to do them.”
“silence is where we hear something deeper than our chatter and silence is where we speak something deeper than our words. All of us know that the most essential things in life are exactly what we can’t express our relation to faith, our relation to love our relation to death our relation to divinity so I think silence is the resting place of everything essential.”
“silence is a journey into the wilderness and into the dark you can’t be sure what you’re going to encounter there and I think many people are rightly wary of silence because we use noise as a distraction and an evasion. Silence is a journey right into the heart of your being, if you allow silence to circulate particularly among people, what you’re going to discover is that your mind becomes aware of what the truth is and sometimes truth is not that sugar-coated… it puts people against a wall and says this is you and you’re human and you’re existing right now and this is your reality do you like it and often people say no”.
Some questions.
How do you feel about silence?
What has been your most profound experience of silence?
What paths in life do we have to walk alone?
What bible stories come to mind when thinking about silence?
Have you read or watched anything that explores silence?
What questions does silence raise for you about the way you live?
How does silence relate to your inner self/prayer?
Peace Rob
Image by NoName_13 from Pixabay
Rob Wylie is the founder of BeachcomberFX and guides its leadership team. He has worked in the North East for over 20 years and has vast experience from various roles he has held. He has a passion for Fresh Expressions of Church and Pioneer Ministry as well as beer, beaches and Miniature Schnauzers.