Quiet is deafening
Did you hear that
I am a fairly quiet person. Overall. I live a quiet life, I speak fairly quietly and I don’t deliberately make loud noises. I don’t mind when others make a bunch of noise because I don’t get to experience it on the regular. It’s entertaining. Everybody gets to manage their own volume. When a recent storm knocked out the power, the house got really quiet. No humming, no buzzing, no beeping, no sound. Excess quiet. The type of quiet that actually wakes you up. Our lives must be full of sound to create that type of outcome. But it’s not great to live without modern conveniences that have their own little soundtrack. Alarms, microwaves, smart speakers, phones and even animals all have their own language. The purring of a cat never gets overwhelming, but the recurring beeping of an oven timer actually elicits a response. And I know it doesn’t really hear me answering it. I doubt it wonders if I am really coming to turn it off or not. But being quiet can make us nervous. We expect noise as a sign that we are involved in life in some way. Even if that is just the grunting heard at the gym, humans are comfortable with this type of common sound. We know its meaning. But quiet must be filled to have a form unless we just sit back and listen to it. It is difficult to not want to find something to fill it up. It feels like it needs help. Maybe more storms will help me determine how to sit back and enjoy quiet more.
That was explosive
Option #1: When did you last experience complete silence?
Option #2: How can you enjoy sound levels more?
Option #3: Is there any reason to seek more quiet times?
That’s it. After you choose the option that best describes the sound of silence to you, take a few minutes to describe why you chose that option and what action, if any, may come next.
