Have you ever had something in your life that was bothersome, so stressful and you felt as if no one would listen? Have you ever been surrounded by people and at that moment feel more alone than ever before? Silence has such a powerful energy, it's truly like nothing I've ever felt before, like no other energy source. Silence has the power to calm you, make you think, make you feel uncomfortable, make you feel alone, make you happy or completely turn your work upside down. It's intriguing that the sound of absolutely nothing can have such a positive or negative impact in our lives.
In the moment when silence is very much needed people feel the need to fill the void with endless chatter, tv, music or noise of some kind. We've all become so accustomed to noise we don't realize the majority is merely background and silence would be what's needed and not the noise. We could turn our thoughts and our focus inwards and refuel our minds. Our thoughts get in the way of reality sometimes and we lose sight of the world around us. Take a mental "time out". Sit back, clear your mind and look at the beautiful and positive things that surround us not the negative ugly situations we are in.
One of the best time to use the power of silence is during an argument. Your ego will try to force it's way out and finish the argument, but believe it or not, you are in control, not your ego. When that person is shouting at you, looking for an argument you can literally take all the power away from them by saying absolutely nothing. This may be difficult to do but boy is it effective.
One of the worst times to receive silence when you have opened up to someone and they say nothing, regardless if it's a verbal conversation or a text message. It's when your you're waiting and anticipating they'll say the right thing, they'll say the right thing, They'll apologize if they've been wrong, they'll give you something in return but instead you get silence, not just the "quite gone in five seconds silence" but the "It's so quiet you can hear the earth turn last for eternity heartbreaking, torturous kind of silence."
Obviously, there's good silence, bad silence, and the unforgivable silence, but what about the power of speech? Speech allows us to express our feelings, show our emotions explain ourselves, strengthen relationships and sometimes speech can influence others. You would think that silence is a completely negative thing since it's the absence of speech. Speech can make or break you demanding on the situation, this is a given. Saying the wrong thing can be hurtful but replacing it with silence can equally as damaging.
I guess my article this week is just to point out that our voices and the absence of it are both so powerful. We need to be more careful with our words and more protective of our silence.
