Silent No More

March 19^th, 2013

Free speech has a whole new meaning

I am out of silence! I have been in silence for three full days, only speaking a little bit to my 60-something Norwegian roommate at night to offer things to help each other sleep better. THREE DAYS with no speaking. Not just being alone with nobody to talk to for three days, but surrounded by people I wanted to talk to, including three friends of mine who arrived at the monastery on my  second day of silence. I couldn’t believe all the chattering my mind did once I stopped my mouth. Most of the time, I imagine my thoughts being made of images or little movies, not whole sentences. Boy did that change. After my first day of silence, it wasn’t so peaceful anymore- at least not in my head. Not only did I begin to hear my mind trailing on whole sentences, but whole paragraphs were being recited at a time. I even had conversations with my own mind, begging it to JUST SHUT UP PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

If only my mind would abide by this rule...

I have felt awful for exactly three days, and this has made silence even more difficult. I have had so much exhaustion, paired nicely with a dull but sometime pulsing headache between my eyes and in the back of my head. I felt so groggy, so tired, by the third day I was about ready to cash in my chips and just leave Thailand all together. It could have been a lot of things, not eating after 11am for three days straight, cutting myself off from the yucky instant coffee they offer here, all the thoughts banging around in my brain, all the stress those thoughts brought me. Who knows, but the good news is that today I woke up at exactly 6am and just about jumped to my feet. I feel great today! AND I am speaking today. What a strange feeling, I keep getting the feeling that I am speaking in a library when I talk today, breaking the rules. I am finding myself instantly wanting to blah blah blah all over the place. However, I am really trying to take care of my words and choose them, rather than just let the internal monologue spill out onto everyone I come in contact with. I feel my mind wanting to speak anything, but my heart is wanting to speak softly and kindly.

That “silence” nametag I have been wearing during this time has been really good for me. There was a moment, on my second day here, when I was in a room with several other English speaking girls who I had met on my arrival here, before I had gone into silence. These girls talked a lot. The rule here is that you can speak, but it is encouraged to please speak softly and not too much. All these girls wanted to talk about was how they couldn’t wait to leave the next day, and how they had learned all they could in their three days there. These girls did not come here together, but they obviously enjoyed congregating to share their complaints. I understand that. After working in restaurants and retail for several years, sometimes it just feel so good to get out all your bad feelings and share those bad feelings with other people. It makes you feel less alone. One girl came running in, immediately filling the whole room with her distress. She said that a girl had just told her to keep her shoes tidy and that her feet were dirty. Now, it sounds like the girl who told her this could have maybe been a bit more kind with her words. But at the same time, as I listened to this girl retell the same short story over and over and over again (I was at the other end of the room by the way, observing) and it was clear that she was really trying to get the other girls wrapped up in her bad feelings as she cried and cried and cried.  I felt for her. I really did, because I have been that person before. I have been the one who cried at the tip of a hat, because I needed to, but also because I wanted to. I have been that person who is constantly reacting to every person, place, or thing that came into my bubble. But reacting is a knee-jerk reaction, and when we do it to everything, we don’t ever give ourselves a minute to think about how we want to be in that moment.

My  first urges were to console this person and take on her feelings for her and try to fix them like the other girls were fumbling to do. But I had just started my silence, and I was able to just walk away. I didn’t need to give her any of my energy at all. And that’s something I do a lot, giving away my energy and taking on other people’s instead. I don’t want to do that all the time. It’s tiring, and it’s confusing not knowing who’s energy you are holding. It is mine? Is it hers? Is it somebody else’s? In reality, I didn’t need to be in silence to do that. I can just walk away, but I never let myself do that. Then I would feel guilty for not helping here, regardless of what it ended up leaving me with. Giving myself permission to just walk away the last three days has been really freeing and eye opening to a different way I can live my life if I need to. My energy is important to me, and I would like to treat it as more of a gift I chose to give, instead of something I owe people around me.