The energies have been sending the sounds of silence to me. Instead of words and inspiration they simply smile and nod as if to say hush. I feel silence is called for so I will keep this short and to the point.
Recent research shows that spending time in silence has incredible positive effects on the brain. During periods of meditative silence new brain cells grow, our planning and problem solving abilities improve and our emotions are regulated. Studies have also shown that when constantly exposed to noise, our brains switch off as a form of self-protection, which can cause some problems with learning and development.
Silence is a secret weapon of self-care. With silence, we can go within (which scares some people), lose ourselves and let our mind wander. We can gather our thoughts, or lose our thoughts. Silence is inner peace on a golden platter. I crave silence. In fact I would go so far as to say that I love it to the moon and back, a term generally kept only for conveying my love to my children.
I began meditating in 2009 and have never looked back. Meditation unlocked the door to many problems for me and injected fresh ideas into my life. New concepts and entirely new ways of thinking come to me each time I meditate. I still wonder where the images, words, ideas, and solutions that fill my head in the void of silence come from. They wash in and out like gentle waves, some are like watching a movie playing in which I am living an entirely different life. Others are magic moments when solutions appear from nowhere and I find myself asking, ‘why have I never thought of this before?’. I am always taken on a journey of discovery in my moments of silence and when I return I am refreshed, renewed, and energised. Whether you believe messages from the mind delivered in such meditative moments are from our higher selves, or not, the writing on the wall is there to say that silence is the doorway to incredible brain activity and inner peace.
As Geshe Kelsang Gyatso writes in The Path of Compassion and Wisdom, Meditation is a virtuous mental action that is the main cause for experiencing mental peace in the future. Whenever we practise meditation, whether or not our meditation is clear, we are performing a virtuous mental action that is a cause of our future happiness and peace of mind. We are normally concerned mainly about bodily and verbal actions, but mental actions are more important. Our bodily and verbal actions depend upon our mental action, upon our mentally making a decision.
Silence is a daily ritual that we should all practice, after all, actions always speak louder than words anyway. Enough said, time for silence.