My Soul in Silence Waits

Silence is a powerful thing.

            Perhaps its power is connected to its rarity: we do not live in a world that is often silent. There seems to be always a background noise: a radio playing, the washer running, the hum of traffic. Silence is not just the absence of human-made noises, either: there's a rustling of leaves in the breeze, the morning birdsong, the lapping of water against a shore, &c.

            As humans, we tend to fill up the near-silence with our own noises. We hum and sing. We tap fingers against tables. We speak - to one another, to ourselves, to the dogs (maybe that's just me). And we tend to return, without fail, to words. "Words, words, words!" as Hamlet said.           

            Anyone who knows me knows that I like words. I enjoy linguistics. I take pleasure in finding (and using!) fun and at times obscure words.  (Quoting the verbose Joe in Sunset Boulevard: "Well, I'm a writer!")

            And recently, my spiritual director has been inviting me to simply be still in God's presence - to pray without words. He's encouraging not merely a silence from my lips, but also in my mind and heart. (Apparently thinking in prayerful words defeats the purpose of the exercise.)

            So we sit, at the open and close of our shared journey. And daily, now, I sit in silent prayer.  

            At first, it was awkward, to merely sit while someone else was present, and try to connect wordlessly to God. And, this has taken me some practice, and some days I'm still not very good at it. But I make the effort to be still, and silent, and immerse myself in the presence of God. Some days it's a longer journey, some days but a few moments (by the clock); the time spent is less important than the sojourn itself.

            The background noises are still there, but in that holy space they remain just background, secondary, unintrusive. I do not allow them to infringe on my immersion into the sacred space. Just as I would not let them interrupt a spoken prayer, nor do I give them heed in the silent prayer.

            To be fair, I still read the words aloud to the psalms, and offer my divine office with words - this new practice has merely extended my repertoire of means through which I intend to dance with the divine.

            It's a skill and a practice, and one I have found to be both enjoyable and spiritually edifying. Silence: who knew! A movement of the soul that transcends the barriers of language.

So, if you are too tired to speak, sit next to me, because I, too, am fluent in silence. 
~R. Arnold