Short Story: The determined man who was determined to find silence, but he never could until.....
@innertalks (21927)
Australia
August 16, 2021 7:51pm CST
Freyman Tuffte was a man with great determination.
He had read much about real silence, but he had never experienced it for himself.
Sure, he had been in dark caves, where it was pretty quiet, but he never felt that silence deeply, as it always seemed construed, a physical silence, rather than an innerly felt one.
And so, he asked a monk, at a Buddhist monastery, situated relatively close-by to his house about silence.
This is what the old monk told him:
"What is sIlence? What is its place within the spiritual life?"
"Silence is a misnomer, in that the only silence that is really silence is one that belongs to oneness. As soon as you take your place back in oneness, silence is the only ever present thing that you observe."
"Outside of God's oneness is the eternal noise of separation caused by one part of God talking to another part. Attempted connection is noisy, because all real connection is silent."
"There is an old German saying that goes like this:"
"'Silence is a fence around wisdom.'"
"But I say, 'Silence loves without fences.'"
"Silence is ever fenced in, and yet it contains no fences."
"The fences are not silent, but the silence constructs fences around itself of nothingness but itself. The silence goes out and comes back the same."
"The fences are not fences, but really the illusion of separation of oneness."
"You tried to find silence in a cave once, now, didn't you?"
"But, you will find that real silence hasn't got anything to do with withdrawal, into a safe inner sanctuary, and to think so, is an illusion too."
"Yes, any form of withdrawal actually creates some type of inner noise."
"Withdrawal is never the answer."
"The opposite state of embracing silence, rather than trying to withdrawer into it is subtly different, because one state is of love loving, whilst the other state is from fear fearing, and trying to escape the fear of everyday existence."
"Fear can never be escaped from, nor walked away from, but must be faced with love, and healed by loving to restore the only real silence that exists, which is God's oneness of love living in you as you."
The Monk then said,
"Perhaps, I have unsilenced your mind with too much talk. I will take my leave now. Have a silent day, in your heart, but allow your mind to enjoy its own noises; it can never be fully silenced at all."
Photo Credit: The photo used in this article was sourced from the free media site, pixabay.com
The Monk gave an enlightening talk to the mind of a noisy man, and left him silent in his wake.
Freyman had dropped into his heart, as the Monk talked, and he had felt the silence there now, at long last.
5 people like this
4 responses
@DocAndersen (54402)
• United States
17 Aug 21
silence is the dream that all parents share, to revel in silence as your toddler walks around the house!
2 people like this
@innertalks (21927)
• Australia
17 Aug 21
Yes, or for it to stop crying at night, and not keep them awake.
@innertalks (21927)
• Australia
18 Aug 21
@DocAndersen Yes, you are right.
Mother's have a special love that overcomes all possible forms of opposition to it.
Father's do not sometimes have this so much.
They will sometimes lose their cool, and do things that they might regret doing.
Shaking their child, for example, is very bad.
I remember when I had severe asthma as a child, I would cough, loudly all night.
My room was right next to my parent's room.
My Dad would get very upset, as he had to get up to go to work in the morning. He couldn't get to sleep.
One night, he came up with a desperate solution to my coughing.
He came into my room, and he got a large glob of Vick's vapour rub, on his finger.
Instead of rubbing it on the outside of my throat though, he opened my mouth, and shoved it into my mouth, rubbing it all around, and even down on to my tonsils.
It worked, it stopped my coughing alright, but I cried all night instead, from the stinging pains in my mouth, but I muffled the sounds, by my placing my head underneath the blankets, and underneath two pillows too.
2 people like this
@DocAndersen (54402)
• United States
18 Aug 21
@innertalks when you have twins you learn to love crying at night. it means they are alive!
2 people like this
@RasmaSandra (79929)
• Daytona Beach, Florida
17 Aug 21
There might be silence all around but at times thoughts fill my head and sometimes I remember and hear music. So it is never totally silent in my world,
2 people like this
@innertalks (21927)
• Australia
17 Aug 21
Thanks, for commenting here.
The noise of my thoughts annoys me at times.
I try to quiet them down, especially when I am trying to sleep.
But, as the monk told the man here, our mind can never be silent. Its nature is to be noisy.
We can only find silence by dropping into our hearts, where there is no chattering mind to disturb us.
I can do that sometimes, as I dream, meditate, or listen to music.
Perhaps, some of us find comfort in noise too, and fear the silence, so each to their own too, I think.
Your mind must be reasonably quiet at times to hear music, I guess too.
@RasmaSandra (79929)
• Daytona Beach, Florida
17 Aug 21
@innertalks I get inspired by something I read or see and then remembered music fills my thoughts that is very pleasant,
2 people like this
@innertalks (21927)
• Australia
17 Aug 21
@RasmaSandra Yes, sometimes a song plays itself over and over in my head too. It can be pleasant.
@Shiva49 (26686)
• Singapore
18 Aug 21
At times, I do yearn for silence away from the noisy world around me.
But then, we should also find peace anywhere, and no point in running away hiding from life around us.
Then, we may worry about what is happening to the world around us!
I have found beauty and meaning wherever I have lived. At times, the choices were limited but then that led to contemplation to dig deeper into my inner knowing and to reflect on my life.
1 person likes this
@innertalks (21927)
• Australia
18 Aug 21
That's a good approach; sometimes we can find silence amongst the noise.
In a noisy train, with voices, and the lull of the track in the background, many people, myself included, can find the peacefulness, and "quietness" still to still go to sleep, and even to miss their stop sometimes too, as a result of their so doing.
I travelled for twenty years, for an hours journey every day, each way, to go to my job in a large capital city.
One time, I fell asleep, and I woke up with a start.
I looked at the station, where we were stopped, and panicking I got off, just before the train, had started off again.
I was pleased that I had not missed my stop, until I looked at the sign again, on the station. I had gotten off one stop too early.
Instead of waiting for the next train, I walked the few extra miles to my own station, and the walking certainly woke me up for real then too, as well as providing me with some exercise, as well.
@innertalks (21927)
• Australia
19 Aug 21
@Shiva49 Yes, with twenty years travelling, I have a few more such stories too.
I got on a train once where somebody had put the wrong destination sign on its front, and I ended up at the end of another line altogether. I was very late home that night.
What did you do when you ended up in the depot?
Maybe another bus was leaving soon....
1 person likes this
@Shiva49 (26686)
• Singapore
19 Aug 21
@innertalks I too love walking but at a leisurely pace and that nourishes my brain and even soothes it.
At times, silence is deafening to me and I can think better when in the company of others. I stay more alert even.
I recall once falling asleep on the train and I realized I was the last person on it as the last station was next to mine. I recall in 2009 my wife and I got into a bus in Perth and wanted to just laze around - was a free city ride, why not then? Then the bus went to the bus depot with none else in it except the driver!
1 person likes this
@innertalks (21927)
• Australia
23 Aug 21
Yes, silence, and absence, are connected.
When someone we love is both absent and silent towards us, it is pretty terrible.
