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RESTING OUR HEARTS IN SILENCE – Rev. Judy Ranniger-Meza
OVERVIEW
Finding stillness and the ability to listen within the silence we find there, not only promotes an inner peace that helps ourselves, but it promotes a spacious place of calm and understanding where we can truly listen to others. As we are in the holiday season with many opportunities to be in conversation with others, and in the longer, darker days of winter, we have an opportunity to rest our hearts in silence and be at peace. Join us this Sunday as we continue our exploration of Thich Nhat Hanh’s book, Silence: The Power of Silence in a World Full of Noise and practice stilling ourselves and listening to the sound of silence.
TRANSCRIPTION
This transcription was auto-generated, please excuse typos, errors and omissions.
Rev. Judy Ranniger-Meza (00:02):
Hello. So now that we’ve sandwiched Thanksgiving in between Halloween and Christmas, we’re being treated to endless repetitions of Christmas carols and holiday music. And all of this started well before Thanksgiving. I was in a store right around Halloween and with the Halloween decorations still up, the Christmas decorations were coming. So we are hearing the sounds of the season a lot. In fact, if you hear Holly Jolly Christmas, or what’s the other one I heard? Oh, I saw Mama Kiss in Santa Claus about three or four or seven times while you’re in one store, it gets to be a little much. So I apologize if I’ve given anybody an earworm mentioning those two songs. I’m kind of susceptible to those. So I think one is probably queuing up in my brain right now, purple playing a loop tape later on when I finish talking. So then we add to that the other sounds of the season, the crowded stores, the busy sidewalks, the traffic noise, maybe even that is a little passe.
(01:19):
We so many people do their shopping online. So maybe the sound, the sounds of the season are computer clicks. But even so, those quieter sounds are still something that takes our attention away from a place of stillness and solitude and finding that stillness within that sense of quiet is what we are focused on this month, especially in the busyness of the holiday season and also these dark, darker longer days of winter. Throughout the book, we are focusing on this month silence, the power of quiet in a world full of noise. By thi not Han, he refers to the sound of silence and it is within the silence that we can hear, but we can only really hear it if we have stilled ourselves and become quiet. He says, God is a sound, the creator of the cosmos is a sound. Everything begins with the sound.
(02:25):
So it appears to be a contradiction, right? And yet so much of the spiritual journey, it is true in this paradoxical and mysterious kind of way that the silence can speak to us, but only if we are truly listening. Which brings me to the fourth chapter of the book called Deep Listening, and I’m going to be speaking on chapters four or five and six of the book. And I just have to mention here the irony of standing up here for 20 to 25 minutes talking about silence. So I’m not really planning on doing that. If ever there was a practice, a topic that was ripe for practice, it’s this one and we’re going to be doing some in a little bit. So in this chapter, Han says that silence allows for deep listening and mindful response, the keys to full and honest communication. And he goes on to talk about how we are just simply overloaded and we are just on a regular day-to-day basis in a modern society.
(03:31):
Just lots of sensory input, sensory over overload, but then add the holidays to that and you goes on overdrive. And so there’s just not even enough space. It’s like, oh my God, I can’t fit anymore in my brain or here even right in our heart centers, in our emotional spaces where we’re just so filled with other stuff that we don’t have the space to truly hear and understand others. One of my favorite acronyms for listening and for communication is weight. WAIT. Why am I talking? And I’m sure many of you like me, have had the experience of being in a work meeting or a group of some kind or talking to an individual where you’re pretty sure the person talking can’t answer that question. They started off with a point, but then they wound up kind of meandering all over the place and lost the thread.
(04:31):
Another example, more uncomfortable for me is because I’m guilty of it, is scripting conversations. Has anybody done this? You’re thinking of something, someone you want to talk to and there’s something you have to say. You want to work something out. And so you think, okay, I’m going to say this and then they’re going to say that. And then I’ll say this. Yeah, okay. There’s some sheepish grins in the room and some nodding of heads. So I’m not the only one, but I’ll use myself as the example because I’ve already outed myself that I do this. So this is what it looks like for me. I have this person in mind and there’s something I want to communicate to them. There’s some conversation I want to have, and I think, okay, this is going to be good. I’ve thought this out. I’m prepared. I’m very calm and they’re going to hear what I have to say and we’re going to work this out. It’s going to be wonderful. So I start off with my well thought out, beautifully scripted opening remarks that come from this completely self-aware place, this completely this place of deep centeredness and connection. And lo and behold, the person I’m talking to does not react in the way that I anticipated. In fact, it’s as if they hadn’t listened at all to my wonderful and insightful remarks.
(05:58):
And so then the conversation pretty much goes to shit from there. And I know I should have said gone off the rails, but really the other description is probably more aptt because I just find myself stepping in it and hard to get out. So does my beautifully prepared and well-scripted conversation not go the way that I intended it to. It’s because I wasn’t really listening was I? And so often I think that’s what our conversations are like. Unfortunately, we focus so much on what we have to say, we forget about the listening part, and conversation really does involve both. So why focus on this? Because in the holiday season we have so many opportunities for conversations with people. There’s work parties and there’s holiday gatherings of various sorts, and there’s the holiday meal. And so it might be the person whose politics you cannot stand or a cousin you see once a year or those reminiscing around the holiday table with family about Christmases past or childhood memories, which are often fun and funny and enjoyable and sometimes painful and a little cringey and not so fun.
(07:23):
Or it could be the conversation that you have with a partner that just kind of goes in this same disappointing and discouraging way whenever you have it. And if you’ve been partnered for any length of time and especially the a hundred years that I’ve been married, I guarantee you that you will have some version of the same conversation over and over and over again. I guarantee it. So what we are going to do today is hopefully prepare ourselves for having these conversations from a deeper place of listening than maybe we have had in the past. We will do this within the meditation. I will lead us in by inviting ourselves into one of these disappointing or difficult or troubling conversations we’ve had in the past. And I’m going to anticipate a question you might be having at this point. You might be saying to yourself, well Judy, didn’t you just say that scripting conversations is not a good idea?
(08:26):
Yes, I did. And what makes this different? The conversations we will invite ourselves into within the meditation is that we will be finding the place of quiet and stillness within first, before we speak if necessary, so that it comes from a place of this deep, quiet and calm. Ultimately, the practice we are doing within the meditation is not about the outcome. It is not about whether the conversation results in something getting resolved or that it even goes differently. It is ultimately about practicing finding a place of stillness and peace within you regardless of who you are talking to, regardless of what you are talking about, regardless of what’s happening around you. It is about practicing listening from the sweet spaciousness of silence that Reverend Darrell referenced in his talk last week and not falling into the mindless habit of selective listening. He cautioned us about hearing only what we want to hear or checking in and out of the conversation depending on whether we like what is being said or not.
(09:45):
TNA Hanh recommends using the sound of a bell to bring you into meditation. Actually three sounds of the bell, and we will use that in just a moment. You may be familiar with certain faith paths that use the sounding of a bell as a call to prayer. Islam does this or other sacred sounds like the sound of the shofar in Jewish ritual. And what these sounds have in common is that they invite us into a space, a sacred space, and it can be a sacred space of prayer. It can be the space of collective ritual, it can be the space of meditation. So you will hear the sound of the bell three times throughout the meditation that I will lead us in. And at each sound of the bell, there is an invitation to deepen further into this inner pace of place of connection and peace. I invite you now to close your eyes or have a soft gaze and bring to mind a person with whom you have had conversations that did not go well or perhaps ones where you simply notice that you have not been truly present for and actively listening. So I’m going to pause now so you can bring that person and that conversation to mind.
(11:26):
Han encourages us to create a spaciousness within ourselves because it is only within the spaciousness that we can truly listen to and help others. This meditation invites us to drop into that spaciousness. So as you settle your body on your chair or wherever you are sitting with a few mindful breaths, allow your body to soften. Begin distill your mind and imagine yourself in an open area. Perhaps it is a field or meadow of some sort or near a large body of water. Feel the spaciousness of this place. Breathe deeply into this spaciousness. Allow it to relax you, feeling light, free and at ease. Now, imagine bringing this spaciousness within you so that this spaciousness is now both within you and surrounding you. This is your essence. This is your true self. Whatever happens next can happen in this spacious place of light, love and ease. This place of self listening deeply. In this place of spaciousness, bring to mind the person and the conversation you would like to have. Notice what comes up for you when you see this person, when you anticipate the conversation that you will have with them, notice any tension, worry, or anxiety you may find there. Notice sadness, perhaps that these conversations have gone so poorly in the past,
(13:53):
Annoyance or anger. Now, invite those feelings, those parts of yourself to step aside. See if they’re willing to move aside. They don’t have to go away. They can simply move over and not take center stage. If you can feel the lightness, the spaciousness within you, you’re ready to invite your person into the space. If you still feel the sadness or the anger, the tension or the worry, invite these parts to step further aside. If these feelings do not move aside or lessen within you, just be with them and yourself in a place of compassion. It simply means you’re not ready for that conversation at this time, and that is okay. You can simply stay in a place of compassion with yourself throughout this meditation. If you’re feeling the spaciousness, bring the person you have to mind in this space. Now begin to listen to what this person has to say. Listen to the typical words they use. Notice the usual way the conversation goes. Notice any urge within you to speak, to explain to correct and allow it to pass. Staying in the space of deep listening, allow yourself to feel any discomfort that comes with not speaking and simply allow it to pass as well.
(15:40):
Imagine that you are able to, when necessary, ask questions that help you to understand more clearly what they are saying and that these questions come from a place of open-hearted. Curiosity if you want to say something when you speak, ask yourself if these are words that can help them to heal. Are they based in compassion, in love that senses and knows the interconnectedness you have to this person? If so, this is what thi not Han calls right speech. Allow yourself to say these words. If no words come, that is okay to just see if you can look at your person with eyes of compassion. Now, notice how you feel at this moment. Do not focus on the person or the desired outcome. Simply notice how you feel having stayed in this place of spaciousness while having this conversation. Be aware of how your relationship to listening and to this person may have shifted in this spaciousness. Now as you already bring your conscious awareness back to the room and open your eyes. So if you’re like me, this time that I gave you for this dropping in may have not been enough time to find that space and have that conversation when I’m in the seats and someone is leading me. By the time I’ve gotten myself centered and I’m ready, the meditation’s over. So if that was your experience not to worry, you can. This is something that you can do on your own when you can have more time to take with it.
(18:12):
You heard me at the start of the meditation, invite you to take a mindful breath in chapter five, the power of stillness. Tna Hanh describes mindful breath as home base. When we breathe mindfully, when we pay attention to our inbreath and to our outbreath, we bring ourselves back to this centered place, this place of home. He says, with the act of breathing mindfully, you go inside, your body is breathing and your body is your home. In each breath, you can come home to yourself. And it is in this home, this place of home that we can encounter feelings of anger or sadness or loneliness and not become made prisoner by them. In this space, we can take care of these feelings without becoming overwhelmed. And so there was something really powerful about this idea of the mindful breath that connected with something with me in a powerful way. And I began to see a theme in what I was reading in the book and in the reading I selected, and even a quote from Earnest Holmes that I recalled, it was this idea of silence, of stillness of breath as a kind of song. In our reading today, it says, rest your heart in silence. And a thousand songs you never heard before will pour into your ears
(19:48):
Not. Hans says, if you pay attention as you breathe, it’s as though all the cells in your body are singing the same song. And Ernest Holmes talked about the eternal voice forever whispering in our ears that which forever sings and sings.
(20:07):
We need to find more ways to bring mindfulness into our activities as Reverend Darrell mentioned in his talk, so that we can walk mindfully, we can wash our dishes mindfully. We can brush our teeth mindfully. There are so many activities of our day-to-day lives that we can bring this attention to. And I would posit that the holidays are a wonderful time to do this, to bring mindfulness to our interactions, to our activities, to our conversations, and to practice it. And I have to out myself a little bit here outside of the formal sitting meditation that I do every day. It’s a bit of a challenge for me to bring mindfulness to my activities. I am a big time daydreamer and I kind of love my daydreaming, and I also really enjoy sitting at the breakfast table with my coffee and my breakfast and the paper and the crossword puzzle. That’s not mindful eating. I know. And I’ve got to ask Daryl if you can mindfully daydream, I’m going to ask him that. But there are many ways. There are other ways in my life that I can bring mindfulness to my activities. And I encourage you to find those activities in your day-to-day life, that you can bring more mindfulness too and begin to practice.
(21:26):
In chapter six of the book, Thich Nhan describes what the Buddha called the island of self, the peaceful place inside us. And this is a place we were connecting to hopefully in that meditation. But it’s also a place that we don’t even recognize that is there a lot of the time. We can be so busy that we don’t know whether we’re coming or going and how many people keep the music or the TV going on in their house or in their car all the time as background, or it’s the monkey mind that’s going and thinking or all the things that are turning maybe within our emotional bodies. These are all examples of the ways that we are pulled away from this island of self and where we’re not even feeling really grounded at all. So the good news is that this island of self exists at all times, unlike the mythical island of Brigadoon. If you ever saw that movie with Gene Kelly, this mystical island that only appeared once every 100 years out of the mist, fortunately for us, our island of self is available to us whenever we quietly, mindfully turn to it.
(22:44):
So to close my talk today, we are going to use the three sounds of the bell to take us into a place of quiet and reflection. And we’ll be do this by me. Bring me using the reading again, and I’m going to read it three times and I will start each reading with the sound of the bell. And again, the invitation is to go deeper and deeper into the words of the poem and bring yourself into a deeper place of reflection. Action. Let there be silence. Let there be reverence in your heart. Let all the sounds of earth flood over you and be heard because you have known how to keep silence in yourself in order that you may receive that which only silence can make possible. Drop down your burdens on the earth and feel the strength of earth well up through you. Flow upward from the ground through bone and sinou into strength west. Your heart in silence and a thousand songs you never heard before will pour into your ears. Throw open the doors of your heart to all. And as its invitation answer finds, your heart will be full. And they who come be filled as well.
(24:15):
Let there be silence. Let there be reverence. Let there be welcome. And there will be wonder in your heart. Let there be silence. Let there be reverence in your heart. Let all the sounds of earth flood over you and be heard because you have known how to keep silence in yourself in order that you may receive that which only silence can make possible. Drop down your burdens on the earth and feel the strength of earth well up through you. Flow upward from the ground through bone and sinew into strength. Rest your heart in silence. And a thousand songs you never heard before will pour into your ears. Throw open the doors of your heart to all. And as its invitation answer finds, your heart will be full. And they who come be filled as well. Let there be silence. Let there be reverence. Let there be welcome. And there will be wonder in your heart. Let there be silence. Let there be reverence in your heart. Let all the sounds of earth flood over you and be heard because you have known how to keep silence in yourself in order that you may receive that which only silence can make possible.
(25:53):
Drop down your burdens on the earth and feel the strength of earth well up through you. Flow upward from the ground through bone and nu into strength. Rest your heart in silence. And a thousand songs you never heard before will pour into your ears. Throw open the doors of your heart to all. And as it’s invitation answer finds, your heart will be full. And they who come be filled as well. Let there be silence. Let there be reverence. Let there be welcome and there will be wonder in your heart. And so as we stay in this sweet spaciousness of silence, we turn now to prayer knowing that in that spaciousness, in that silence, we can encounter that still small voice, that knowing, that presence, that love, that peace and joy, that eternal presence, that limitless freedom, this spacious place where I find God and why, whatever name we know, it is that place of stillness, that place of quiet, that place of peace is there for us as we turn to it. I know it is my life. I know it is everyone. Here’s life and all those who are online and encountering this service at a later time. We are all one in this sweet spaciousness of silence, of God, of peace, of love, of joy.
(27:53):
And so I know that as we go forth from here connected to that spacious place, knowing that we are mindfully turning toward it even as we drive home today, even as we do other things through this day and our days forward, that we are consciously, intentionally making space for this time, making space for ourselves to rest our hearts in silence, to be in a place of peace and love and joy, knowing that it fills us, it guides us, it animates us. It brings us through what might be busy or even difficult holiday season or the difficulty of the longer, darker winter days, whatever it may be, or just the joy that we experience in life. We are connected. We are one and we are filled. And when we are filled, we can’t but help that exude this fullness, this joy and this peace and this love out to those around us, those in our family, our friends, our circles. And so we just commit to this going forward, to be that peace within, so that peace emanates outward from us in a world that so desperately needs peace. And so I’m grateful to have been with you today in this spaciousness of silence, practicing and deepening in our faith and in our love, in our commitment to be our individual and collective experience of God in the world. I’m so grateful and so I release this prayer knowing that it is already done. I release it and call it good. And together we say, and so it is.