This is From The Balance Beam

[TheBalanceBeam] - The Sounds of Silence

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THE BALANCE BEAM
Ideas and Inspiration for Creating a Life that Works
Vol. 3 No. 8, July 18, 2002
Published by Success Builders, Inc.
http://www.SuccessBuildersInc.com
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"He who knows others is wise; he who knows himself is enlightened."
Lao-tzu
In this issue: THE SOUNDS OF SILENCE
====================================================================== Dear Friends:
Right now, wherever you are reading this, imagine being immersed in a place of total peace and quiet - no computer hum, no cell phones, no beepers, pagers, conversations, kids yelling or TV blaring. Just blissful silence, in which to pause and reflect. This issue of The Balance Beam is devoted to silence....and the value that it can add to your life.

If you are interested in reading earlier editions of The Balance Beam, you can easily retrieve them by clicking on http://www.successbuildersinc.com/newsletter.html and going to the Archives section. If you are not yet a regular subscriber to The Balance Beam, you can also enter your subscription information at this location.
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Today's Topic: THE SOUNDS OF SILENCE

Despite my attempts to have some peace and quiet, in the fifteen minutes since I first sat down to begin conceptualizing and writing this article, I've been surrounded by sounds. I've heard the trash collectors riding through the neighborhood emptying garbage bins, someone mowing the lawn in a yard nearby, the air conditioner in my house kicking on, a car with no apparent muffler rumbling down the street, and my dog barking at the car. Oh, and the phone rang twice.

We live in a noisy world. There's so much going on around us that we often don't even notice how much sound and stimuli we're processing. This is especially true in the business arena, and particularly in this country. A client of mine works for a Scandinavian-based organization, and we were having a discussion about this last week when he returned from a trip to Denmark. One of the cultural differences he noticed about the Danish business environment was how they engineer silence into their conversations. Their meetings are regularly punctuated by periods of intentional silence, in which people pause to integrate what has already been offered before leaping in to put more on the table.

Just imagine how that kind of practice would fly in our culture. In most of the meetings I attend, not only are there no breaks in the action, there's not enough airtime to accommodate everything that everyone has to say. You've no doubt witnessed this phenomenon. No sooner are the words out of one guy's mouth than the one sitting next to him has seized the floor to insert his two cents. Now, in some ways, this can be efficient. We certainly know how to cover a lot of ground in a short period of time. On the other hand, I have to wonder how much of what is said in this type of context really sinks in.

The ability to be with silence is a cultivated skill. For most of us, it doesn't come naturally and it often feels uncomfortable. As an example, just think about what happens when you get in the car to drive somewhere by yourself. Most of us are tuned to the CD player or talk radio or books-on-tape or a cell phone conversation. In fact, how many of us even remember where the power button is to turn all that stuff off? It's typically a matter of which modality we will choose, not whether to have it on or off.

Our everyday conversations are like that, too. Part of why it's difficult for us to sustain silence is that it's difficult for us to listen - really listen - to what those who are speaking are saying, and to try to step into their experience before we move on. We're well mannered enough to offer a polite acknowledgement before we jump in, but all the while, what we've really been contemplating is what we want to say next.

It's true that silence is golden, even if it's difficult to achieve. Many Eastern and meditative philosophies advocate silence as a tool for reflection, developing an inner awareness and cultivating present-moment living. Robert Rabbin, an author who describes himself as a "modern mystic" has regularly engaged in the intentional practice of silence throughout his life. He writes, "When you don't project your internal process through speaking, you develop a capacity for observation that you otherwise wouldn't have. Using this power of observation, I could see so many ways in which I was purely reactive, unconscious - automatically wanting to defend and protect myself and my beliefs."

Imagine a business environment where people chose to step away from this reactive way of being...where coworkers and leadership teams would take time to thoughtfully reflect on and consider one another's ideas...where people would combine their brilliance and practice add-on thinking instead of one-upmanship. Imagine how learning to live with a little bit of silence could facilitate this manner of interaction. And just imagine the results a team like this could produce. It's enough to give the notion of being quiet a whole new meaning.
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Words to live by:
"Silence is the language of God; It is also the language of the heart."
- Dag Hammerskjold

" To the mind that is still, the whole universe surrenders."
- Chuang Tzu

"It is as important to cultivate your silence power as it is your word power."
- William James

"Silence is golden."
- Old saying