The Power of Silence

What did you not say yesterday? Were there things you wish you had said but held back? Did you corral certain words, certain sentences, and hold them for another opportunity? Were some thoughts pushed below the surface, allowed to be changed with time, perhaps to be forgotten forever? How many “I love you’s” went unsaid that would have healed an aching heart? As with sleep, you cannot store them and build a reserve to tap into at a later date. Their power, their balming effect, quickly dissipates with disuse. They work only in the moment that they were intended. Left idle, their potential is gone, the object of their delivery untouched by kindness, by tenderness.

“I love you.” It is so simple to say. Three words. There are many other opportunities to say them, but none more important and possessing more potential than now. Words can have the opposite effect if left unsaid, almost as if they were spoken as opposites. Silence can equal the opposite. “I love you” unsaid can become “I don’t love you” out loud. Your most tender and endearing thoughts, if not allowed to fly free from the prison of your mind, may silently tell someone that you don’t care. How many times has your silence told your partner or child that you didn’t love them? How often has an unsaid word created the opposite effect? Think of all the lives that would have been changed had armies of sentences been allowed to roam free. Those who go through life cloaked in spoken endearments, wrapped and comforted in the voiced love of others, are truly blessed. The power of the spoken word is mighty. The power of silence can be mightier still.

Countless millions of words have been written and spoken since the beginning of human history. A total of all the words in all the libraries of the world, past and present, and every word of every conversation, idle chatter, lecture, broadcast, and speech in history would be dwarfed by the vast legions of words left unsaid, those rendered impotent by silence. Not that it is a good thing to instantly speak every thought that comes to mind: chaos would ensue. We have to be selective of our words and deliver them into the pattern of conversation where appropriate; however, it is our mental editing that isolates certain words and thoughts as unspeakable, and sentences them to die (pun intended).

Words can change the world. They can incite, torture, kill, comfort, heal, encourage, humiliate, anger, inspire, sadden, give joy, make one laugh, and they can forever change one’s life. There are many kinds of words: “In other words,” four-letter-words, words that are read, words to make you blue; there is the spoken word, the written word, the forgotten word; we put words in someone’s mouth, and we don’t have the words to express…. Words, words, everywhere, and not a thought to speak. And the unsaid words—oh, how they could have changed the course of history! Would they have altered the destructive lives of John Wilkes Booth, Adolph Hitler, Lee Harvey Oswald, Jeffrey Daumer, or the Son of Sam? Would the unspoken “I love you’s” have given them a new lease on life had those three words been bestowed upon them?

The power of words and their silent cousins: “What did you say?” “Nothing.” Think of the consequences had that “nothing” actually been, “I was wrong. I’m sorry. I apologize and want to make it up to you.” Instead, a relationship was probably hurt forever, or even eventually terminated. “Ouch, that hurts,” if left unsaid, can become one of many familiar wedges in a marriage, or any relationship. Not expressed, it can fester inside, becoming worse and much larger over time than it originally was. It also will accumulate other unsaid “ouches,” and grow to become a very powerful “I hate your guts.” It can eat at one’s insides if not voiced. Actually, its release will help the relationship; its incarceration will destroy.

Don’t withhold. Let the hostages go. Release the words while they still hold their meaning. Release them before they change in silence. The loneliest place in the world, more desolate and forbidding than the blackest cell of any prison, is a silent marriage/partnership. All the city lights from Manhattan to Bangkok could probably be powered by the turbulent energy of the silent, but unrelenting, dialogues churning in the minds of an unhappy couple. And it would be possible, as well, to freeze solid the oceans of the world by the dynamics between the two.

Allow your thoughts to be heard. You are the most powerful person on earth. You alone possess the ability to change your world, make friends, and influence people. You have the key. Use your words for good. They can help you. Don’t withhold them, for in their muted state they can turn on you. Life is a fine balance of releasing the right words in the right order at the right time, and deciding which words are truly better left unsaid.

© 2001 Stuart Vail

Reflections of Truth

It was 9:00 a.m. The bay was at high tide, and very calm—almost glassy. I was at a little guest cottage across Puget Sound from Seattle. With my elbows resting on the railing of the deck, I was enjoying the peacefulness of the bay with a morning cup of coffee. Suddenly, out of the North, a flock of geese noisily flew right past me. They were only about a foot above the water, and their reflections in the nearly-perfect mirror below made it seem as if there were twice as many geese. As they roared by I immediately focused on those reflections, whose wings were beating in counterpoint to the real wings above. Then they were gone.

It happened so fast. In a split second I had chosen to experience the flock from its reflection. Once committed, I had to stay with it. After the squawks of the geese had faded I was left with an inverted vision of the birds: strange creatures beating their wings upward. My experience was merely a reflection of reality, an inverted and not entirely true representation of what had transpired. But that was what I knew.

We are faced daily with such distortions and constantly have to interpret what we think we saw or heard. Films based on “true facts” offer their interpretations of reality, often becoming “untrue facts.” For improved ratings the murderess is upgraded to being young, blond, and sexy, when in fact the real culprit originally might have been a frumpy, middle-aged housewife. The screen version concocts a handsome lover, fast cars, and gratuitous sex. Don’t bore the public with just the facts; remember: Ratings!

This kind of distorted perspective happens quite often. Nightly news shows—competing against at least four other stations, all showing the same reports of rape, drive-by shootings, and governmental gerrymandering (did I mention “rape”?)—will enhance their versions of events to make them more sensational, streamlined, and salable. The version of reality that is presented to the public is “brought to you by” the quest-for-ratings-influenced station manager. Had we taken the time to read a more fact-oriented newspaper instead of being entertained by the “Reader’s Digest” condensed TV version, replete with commercials, perhaps we would have a more accurate concept of what is really happening in the world.

Some people will tend to listen to others “in the know” before forming their own understanding of reality. Sometimes their opinions are based on those of the last person with whom they just spoke, only to be changed with the next. A mere glance at the tabloid headline at the market leaves us with the “knowledge” that Madonna is pregnant with an alien’s baby (further reading deep inside the issue would reveal that the “alien” was her Brit husband). Rumors take on the form of Truth. Even in the face of Truth, rumors can hold forth as the Gospel because they have settled too comfortably in the mind of their host. Parasites can be hard to dislodge.

To persuade a certain senator to vote on a particular bill, his own interests have to be served, perhaps in votes for his bill which has a hidden rider that will fund an airstrip near his house and new asphalt for his district’s county roads. Distractions everywhere. Reality is disguised by the twisted reflections that are provided to us.

We go through life making daily choices of what to believe and which versions of reality we will embrace. Sometimes the choice is the wrong one, but we don’t necessarily know that. We cling to that speeding vision, and when it is gone it is all we know. We know it as the Truth, and proceed to parrot that Truth, right or wrong, to those around us.

We need to be able to see the geese for what they are. We need to see past the distracting reflections of Truth and discern what is real and what is not. One day the water may not be glassy. There will be no reflection—clear, or even blurry—to distract us from the real thing. And when Truth comes right up to stare us in the face, we may be unable to recognize it for what it really is.

© 2001 Stuart Vail