i<3franciscans Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 Before I began discerning I hated silence! I have my ipod in pretty much all the time. Then a very wise friar told me "To not be afraid to spend with just yourself and the Lord." That s when I realized I was scared, but I knew it had to change if I was really going to start discerning. It is has been two and a half years since then and I have never turned back. I now look forward to time when I can be alone with My Beloved. I have learned so much about myself in times of silence, and I wouldn't trade that for anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dominicansoul Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 for me, it isn't too hard to find silence in my everyday schedule .... exterior silence that is... its the interior silence i struggle with, i'm prone to have so many thoughts going at once, plans of the day, what I've experienced, worries, anxieties, etc. etc. ...so, remember, when you seek silence, not only to seek it exteriorly, but interiorly as well... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
i<3franciscans Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 I am the opposite of you DS. Being the second oldest of eight kids.... exterior silence is tough, but I usually go for a walk. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marigold Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 I missed some good threads over Christmas! BarbaraTherese and nunsense I like your reflections on silence vis a vis community or living alone. I was always the only one out of my friends who had to have complete quiet in order to study. I saw a TV program on psychology which touched on this and apparently needing noise to help you concentrate means you're extroverted and needing quiet means you're introverted. They tested it on someone from a profession which typically has extroverts (an events organiser or something), and again on a classical musician, who typically are introverts. The first was indeed an extrovert but the violinist surprised everyone by concentrating best with a lot of noise and activity. When I first visited the monastery, I was worried about finding the silence difficult since it's soo rural - but I didn't even notice it! No idea why it was so easy, perhaps I was just focusing on other things. Actually I found the silence a lot more difficult when visiting the monastery of St. John the Baptist which is in a much more built-up area just outside of London. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SNJM Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 [quote name='BarbaraTherese' timestamp='1324704699' post='2356855'] I found that monastic Silence, living alone and the silence of the Australian bush are all different. Each had their own depth and profoundness alive with Presence. I experience to date the most Profound Silence - living Presence - alone in the Australian bush and have come to prefer living alone with Silence to any other way of life with escapades to the Aussie bush alone now and then. For me personally, monastic Silence was also filled with the presence of others and I do prefer living alone. But I was reading today that we are all absolutely unique and God treats us speaking Uniquely to that uniqueness - and He has us all "carved into the Palm of His Hand" (Scripture: "How can I forget you, why I have carved you into the Palm of My Hand") I did know a time of great loneliness and the silence was overwhelmingly haunting and totally empty - so much so that once I literally cried tears (I dont cry easily at all) and said to myself "No one should be this lonely and alone". Nowadays I often wonder and feel an empathy for those who do experience life with such emptiness of being alone and very lonely. I heard statistics the other day and by 2015 30% of Australians will be in their mature years and most living alone - it has affected me sufficiently to keep them in mind and God Willing I will be in their number and hope that my love of Silence will continue into my final years until I am called away from this earth. May God so bless all living alone. _________________ Joy to all at Christmas and in this season of Joy - and His Peace and Joy in 2012 and always! [/quote] BarbaraTherese, You said this so beautifully, I am going to cut it out and put it in my journal. Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Indwelling Trinity Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 The silence You speak of is the trysting place where God woo's the soul inviting us in the deepest recesses our our hearts to bind us irrevocably to himself. To me this is a foretaste of what heavenly beatitude will be for those who love God.; a silence pregnant with the pure presence of God. It was this silence i experienced often as a young teenager and as a young religious. During my early years in religious life it was filled with many emotional highs and lows. Over the years it became more profound but not yet a habitual dwelling place. After about 20 years it became almost habitual on a level i could not understand intellectually or emotionally any longer. Laughing... I foolishly thought i had arrived! In time I went through a period of silence so obscure, i thought God had completely abandoned me. It was a deep void bringing me seemingly almost to the brink of despair.and yet after may months i found that God was there too in all of that bleakness but i could not see it. My superior had to see it for me and explain it to me for of myself i could not comprehend it. All i could comprehend was deep pain of feeling lost. But what i learned from that was by His seeming absence He was creating in me a deeper longing to seek his face. It also gave me an infinitesimal glimpse of what the agony in in the Garden was like for Jesus. It showed me my nothingness without his grace and i realized that that very void i was feeling was in itself a grace... the privlege of a relationship between nothing and All. A loving relationship where an all loving God communicates with that which is nothing save for his sustaining love which gives it life and meaning. In that bleak silence God was purifying my weak love. Asking me in that silence if i loved him for himself or for his gifts alone? In that silence i had to make a choice.... the choice of whether to walk into the fire of purifying love or to hold back and continue the ways i had become accustomed too. I think i chose the former although i am not sure. God remains silent even amidst the turbulence of these past couple of years, but i think in this silence despite the tears, he continues to be present and my peace if any lies in acceptance whatever he is doing in my life, He is the potter and i am the clay. It is in faith that i believe in the end He will make something beautiful out of a life that at this point now feels like a failure. I am reminded that this is the patrimony that Jesus left us... The patrimony of the cross where in seeming utter failure was born the resurrection and infinite beatitude. Even though i only wish to run away, My heart is fastened to Him in the memory of those younger years when my heart rejoiced in the silence of His presence calling me to be his very own. By God's grace i said yes then and i pray that by his grace i may live out that tiny fiat i uttered in my heart when he first wooed me to himself.. Is the same love there? I think yes... but today it is a more mature love that with his grace may stand solid amidst the storms of life. It is a love that even amidst the deepest pain, I can still enter into the depth of my heart and soul and hear his voice in the tiny murmuring of a gentle breeze. There are many different shades of silence in the spiritual life, the grace is to be able to hear his voice not through elation or desolation but through silent faith. I think if I can do that then with God's grace tranquility will remain and in the end i will find safe harbor in His Love. As Tagore once said , "His Mercy is gentle as silence...." Just some random thoughts.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
i<3franciscans Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 That was beautiful! Your insight is awing. Thank you so much for sharing! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
organwerke Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 [quote name='Because I love Him' timestamp='1324525467' post='2355704'] Hey Everybody! So the other night I was hanging at the church after having gone to confession and I realized how silent it was, there wasn't any noise at all, not even cars passing by (wich is rare it is on a very busy street) and I was able to be absorbed in prayer. I felt such peace and was able to give my full attention to Jesus and because I gave that time to JEsus He showed me yet again how He wants me to become a Nun. So I guess what I'm getting at here is that in those times of silence Jesus can show you alot, silence can start now outside the convent and that can probably be the key to knowing whether you are supposed to be a religious or not. Silence is amazing and a beautiful thing, it can be found eveywhere if you look hard enough and is important for eveyone to experience. [/quote] I envy you so much! It's a long time I can't be absorbed in prayer and in silence...for my fault of course but I was not able to fight enough to have this again Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Indwelling Trinity Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 (edited) Mia Cara sorrellina.... One does not fight for silence... one simply opens oneself to receiving it, for everything is gift first given. Edited January 4, 2012 by Indwelling Trinity Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
organwerke Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 [quote name='Indwelling Trinity' timestamp='1325711314' post='2362943'] Mia Cara sorrellina.... One does not fight for silence... one simply opens oneself to receiving it, for everything is gift first given. [/quote] It can seem strange, but I think one fights for silence: at least when I try to open myself to silence, it seems that every time there is someone fighting against me so that I cannot open to it!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sarah147 Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 I like silence so I can think and pray. I get a good deal of silence, like driving I do silently, and with volunteering I usually have silence. With my small job, there may be some talking or TV in the background, but usually I'm moving in different rooms and able to get silence. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andibc Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Beautiful, Indwelling, thank you so much for sharing. It reminds me of that diagram in St. John of the Cross....nothing....nothing...nothing.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inperpetuity Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 (edited) [b][i]"In time I went through a period of silence so obscure, i thought God had completely abandoned me. It was a deep void bringing me seemingly almost to the brink of despair.and yet after may months i found that God was there too in all of that bleakness but i could not see it. My superior had to see it for me and explain it to me for of myself i could not comprehend it. All i could comprehend was deep pain of feeling lost. But what i learned from that was by His seeming absence He was creating in me a deeper longing to seek his face. It also gave me an infinitesimal glimpse of what the agony in in the Garden was like for Jesus. It showed me my nothingness without his grace and i realized that that very void i was feeling was in itself a grace... the privlege of a relationship between nothing and All. A loving relationship where an all loving God communicates with that which is nothing save for his sustaining love which gives it life and meaning. In that bleak silence God was purifying my weak love. Asking me in that silence if i loved him for himself or for his gifts alone? In that silence i had to make a choice.... the choice of whether to walk into the fire of purifying love or to hold back and continue the ways i had become accustomed too. I think i chose the former although i am not sure. God remains silent even amidst the turbulence of these past couple of years, but i think in this silence despite the tears, he continues to be present and my peace if any lies in acceptance whatever he is doing in my life, He is the potter and i am the clay. It is in faith that i believe in the end He will make something beautiful out of a life that at this point now feels like a failure."[/i][/b] Sounds like the "Dark Night of the Spirit" as described by St. John of the Cross. I loved silence as long as I wasn't suffering trials, and it consoled me. I have always desired that God would bring me to what you are speaking about, and yet feared it because of my weakness. I've had periods of what seemed like this, but wasn't ever willing to stay. Now I believe I have entered once again, but the same fear is not there, and so I am willing to stay this time and trust Him as you are obviously doing. Thank you for posting this. Edited January 5, 2012 by inperpetuity Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blessed&Grateful Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 (edited) When I was discerning many years ago there was a place that I used to go to quite a bit on my "free time" it was a lovely spot in the woods with a statue of our Lady and the crucified Christ. The quiet and silence were remarkable and allowed me to listen so deeply. Yes I was surrounded by nature and the songs of the birds, rustle of the under bush, whispers of the trees but even today when I need quiet to "listen" in my minds eye that is where I go. Edited January 5, 2012 by Blessed&Grateful Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
his_remnant Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 I agree that silence is a beautiful thing. I miss it when I let too much noise into my life...and it is a huge loss that i only realize when i do have a moment of silence. With that said i think i will take a moment now... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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