The Comforts of Silence

 After the group meditation practice today, I shared about the following weekend's practice of Silent Illumination, and lead a short transfer of merit prayer. I decided not to read from one of Shifu's books, even though it had been my original plan (alas, time simply did not permit). But I felt a certain relief in giving myself permission not to say too much. It is as though the silence was a relief to me, and it allowed me to focus more on the sitting meditation than on trying hard to find something useful to share at the end of the practice.
   There is a certain comfort that can be found when people agree to silence, and are not driven to talking all the time. I have had friendships where talking is a kind of expected norm, and silence feels uncomfortable. But in other situations, particularly when I know the person well, silence communicates something quite deep and shared. Now, I wonder, how does it happen that silence becomes 'comfortable'? Is it only an excuse to say that people ran out of things to say to each other? I think that it's a bit deeper than that. Likely, it comes from a kind of confidence that my connection with people does not depend on always saying something to impress or keep it going, as it were. That confidence comes from a shared understanding that might even come from a shared struggle to communicate. But eventually, a shared silence might indicate that there is no longer such a conflict, but there is a synthesis of two different perspectives into one, or perhaps there is a reflection that the two sides are equally valued even though they are different.
   I think that if people didn't devalue silence so much, there wouldn't be so many miserable social situations! I mean--think of all the negative connotations that come from 'silence', such as the terms 'dead silence', 'awkward silence', or 'the silent treatment'. All of these expressions suggest that silence is somehow unnatural or unwanted. But if silence were valued more, people wouldn't feel so pressured to participate verbally, and the things people would say would come from a more grounded state of being that is not invested in trying to be socially accepted.