Live in Balance: A to Z Challenge - E is for...

E is for...Explore

While most people would associate the word 'explore' with activities outside, maybe a little travelling, or going to the local market to find a treasure or two. This time, however, we are exploring one thing that is almost impossible to find in our modern world: silence.

Have you noticed how noisy our world has become? Traffic. Computers. Air-conditioning systems. No matter where you find yourself physically, there is almost always a hum or a buzz going on in your surroundings.

Should we seek out 'silence'?

Take a few minutes to read this article - http://buff.ly/2nL4XO0

When I read the article the first time, I felt overwhelmed by the intensity of the author's experiences. What was the most interesting to me was the end of the article - the experience had not been easy, and yet she was ready to go back to do it all over again. That maybe just her own unique self, but what about the rest of us? Do we seek or avoid the silence?

What do we hear?

In the book, In Pursuit of Silence by George Prochnik, the author himself sought some answers in his pursuit of silence. He visited a monastery and spent some time with monks who spend their lives in silence. What fascinated me was the research George did about the evolution of our hearing and how sad the statistics are on hearing loss.

Did you know our ears are capable of amplifying sound? I didn't know that. If you can imagine the world many, many years ago, there was not so much noise in our environment - no traffic, and certainly no televisions or computers. Back then primitive man needed to be more aware of the slightest sounds around him, his life depended on hearing the threat approach before it was too late.

But our ears are also capable of suppressing sound. And that is nothing new either. Apparently, our own voices were such a strain on our hearing, that the middle ear had to adapt to protect the sensitive inner ear from the 'noise' being generated by our vocal chords.

Hmmm...that could also be the reason that I perceive my voice to sound funny when I hear it played back from a recording. My ears don't like my internal sound generator either! LOL!

Silence is golden, right?

So if we are physiologically designed to live in a more quiet world, why are we accepting the high levels of noise? Do we want to hide from our inner voice by drowning it out with loud music, and technology? Or do we want to find that silence, that place where we can think, dream, and listen to that inner voice?

This question is not answered with a simple yes or no. Consider your surroundings and the noise emanating from it. Is it drowning your inner voice?

Take a few minutes and explore your silence in your journal today. What have you learned? What do you think you can learn if you spend more time in silence?

Need practical ways to find silent time? Check this out - http://buff.ly/2nKQqlm

If you are a writer, you might also like this article - http://buff.ly/2nKIGjq