The Sound of Silence

My car makes strange noises.  I don't know how many people ride around in their cars in silence, but this funny thing happens on a car ride: the car makes noises.

When I have my music turned up and am "singing" the lyrics at an embarrassing volume, I don't hear noises.  I don't hear my engine when I accelerate, my wipers when it rains outside, my defroster blasting the windshield at 6am.  Or, if I do hear the sounds, they are so much the background that they don't matter.

Turn off the music and all of a sudden the sounds of my car take the forefront of my auditory perceptions.

I can hear 1.5 of my 3 loyal readers asking, "But, Beth, why would you ever drive in silence?"  (At which  point I ask myself: "Which of them is only half-speaking to me?")  I drive in silence because in the past few weeks I finally got the hint from God that I need more silence in my life.  Recently, the Pope has been speaking about the need for silence in the spiritual life, and I have encountered everything from old saints to new bloggers who are encouraging silence as more than part of prayer, but as a habit of life.

I decided to start placing deliberate silence in my life in the car.  I'll remember to keep silence as I drive, and my mind won't be racing from one task to the next, the way it is when I am alone in my apartment.  So I flip off the radio at least once a day and spend some quality quiet time with my copilot.

A funny thing happens when I go through life with silence:  I make strange noises.  (Okay, get your laughs out before you read on.)  Not the audible kind, but the background noises that sit in the unobtrusive parts of my life.  Most of the time I can ignore these parts of me, because there are so many other noises that take loud precedents.

I thought I was going to use the time of silence to get to know God better.  Instead, He is using the time to show me more about myself.  Which, I should have known, is part of the journey.  The learning process will help me grow closer to God.  And then, once I get to know my internal noises, I will be able to let them sit quiet while I sit with Him.