Since I was a kid I have appreciated the natural world around me. Having grown up in a small town in the high desert I became accustomed to the bit of remoteness we enjoyed. There was hardly even a significant cluster of street lights in town, so the night sky was always that deep navy and violet dusted with a flurry of pin pricks of light bursting through the dark backdrop. The greatest source of noise pollution was the train that would sometimes come charging through, blowing its horn and the sound would shoot up the canyon. I guess there was always that faint, low hum of cars in the distance that you still get from the main roads. Even with the sounds of modern transportation, as soon as you were in the house, dropped back down the wash or the breeze started blowing all you’d hear was nature.
There was a wonderful quiet to the home I grew up in. The sound of the trees bristling in the breeze, the pattering of paws from our dogs playing in the huge yard. For a time we had horses on our property and you could hear them neighing or getting rowdy in the stalls. Not to mention we had neighbors nearby with horses as well, chickens, goats, ducks and donkeys. This wasn’t suburbia. This was a little slice of country living nestled fifty miles outside of Los Angeles. I loved it. It was different. And when it came time to move to the more suburban Santa Clarita up the road, I really didn’t want to go. As a kid, I loved the quiet sounds of nature and I knew I didn’t want to leave.
Like I’ve mentioned before my dad was a total outdoorsy guy, so it was no accident we grew up in an environment like this. And when you live in a place like that little house in Acton you develop an appreciation for simplicity. You come to appreciate the light of the sun, moon and stars. And rather than have our ear drums pummeled with hustling traffic, cars honking, trucks braking and mashing on the gas, we could settle into the silence. I guess it’s not entirely silence, but the sounds of life. You see, even though as a human race we’ve made great technological advances and these inventions are a testament to our great imagination and our will, these machines are not the sounds of life. What I love and appreciate more than anything, is the sound of the world stripped down to it’s own truest nature.
There is a peace to the sound of life, a comfort to it. It is a simple, but powerful existence because it always is and always will be whether she falls to the background or is allowed to move to the forefront of our experience. The trees are always there moving in the wind, the rivers roaring down the canyon, the rain drops falling from the sky and hitting the Earth or waves crashing ashore. The lightning snapping through the air, thunder rumbling in the heavens, birds cooing high above our lives and the flapping of their wings during the shifting season. These are the the sounds of life existing as it is, existing harmoniously within itself. Oh how I absolutely love to step outside of the world we’ve imposed on real life and sink into her warm embrace.
I absolutely cherish the opportunity to sink into the stillness of the natural world and to soak in both the ease and the power of simply being. I feel like the most powerful moments in life come from being, not doing. Existing, as is. No distractions, no flashy lights or white noise. No agenda, no empty words or wasted energy. I feel like this is a lost experience in our modern world, especially here in America. Everything is go, go, go, fast paced and instant gratification now, now, now. Think about your typical day. Without any conscious effort to sit in silence or take a moment to yourself; no phone, no television, no computer, no iPad, no one near you blabbing your ear off…How often do you get to sit in silence, if ever?
It is a lost practice, a lost art if you will. The ability to just plant yourself in a spot, no matter where it is and just be there. Don’t talk. Don’t text. Don’t play music on your iPod. Just sit down, take a deep breathe and let your senses absorb what’s going on around you. Observe if you feel like doing so, or just close your eyes. What do you feel? Can you sit long enough to let your thoughts exhaust themselves? If you are observing, what do you see? What is around you big and small? Near and far? There is so much out there for us to experience, know and understand. There is also something there for us in that silent space. A gift of awareness. It may come in the awareness of the self. Perhaps some unprocessed emotions will bubble to the surface. Maybe a scent will take you back to a child hood memory and you’ll reconnect to an old part of yourself. It may come in the awareness of your environment. It might come in the form of really observing a flower and all its compact beauty. There is so much to be learned about ourselves and our world in moments of silence.
These meditations are truly serving as a sort of transformative exercise for me. Instead of using my computer to distract me from the silence, I use it to channel what comes to my awareness as I sit here. I find what emerges is my voice, my authentic self. It feels so liberating to connect with this part of me and to reveal these depths. There is so much clarity here and I am learning a lot while I write. It is like these personal revelations come in these moments of quiet contemplation, which when expressed, then lead to more revelation. Writing for me in general serves as a floodgate to my inner life. While one may argue I am not simply sitting in silence as I’ve spoken of above, because I am actually doing something. Yes, I am writing, but as I mentioned it serves more as a device to manifest being now. I sit in my environment, enveloped by the sights, sounds, senses of the moment and as I am inspired I write. What a wonderful opportunity we all have to sit in silence and be inspired to explore or true nature.
-JB
