Today I spent some time appreciating the beautiful simplicity of silence. I began my day with a run of 4.5 miles. Last week I wrote of “running for peace.” There is a silence in those early morning runs. The awareness of my breath. I am running just to run, not to or for, but just running. There is mindfulness in running. Running focuses me in the present moment. I think of other things, but I am more in touch with the present moment when I am running than at nearly any other time of the day. There is peace in that silence. I am at peace in the silence. There is God in the silence. God is silence and presence. Sitting in the monastery chapel is silence and God is in that silence too. More and more I come to appreciate those silent times in my life. Silence is sacred.
“Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to our every chagrin, as welcome after satiety as after disappointment; that background which the painter may not daub, be he master or bungler, and which, however awkward a figure we may have made in the foreground, remains ever our inviolable asylum, where no indignity can assail, no personality disturb us.–A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, Henry David Thoreau.
Tonight as I sit in silence I was thinking of the words of Psalm 46.
Be still and know that I am God.
Be still and know that I am…
Be still and know..
Be still…
Be…