It's odd. I am backwards. I pay to subscribe to those whose writing is important to me precisely because I don't want them fretting if they haven't published something. I want them to have my meager scrap in the meantime, for the day when they are ready to publish.
So great to see this! What a perfect reflection for the New Year. Your content is somewhat unique on my feed (I found you through Ezra Klein actually) which leans toward more...terrestrial stuff, but your absence has also made me realize that you’re a very unique and important source of insight and reflection for me. As for your absence - yeah, life happens. Be well. I’m not going anywhere.
I enjoyed this post immensely, (inspired me to become a subscriber). The quote, “Man does not put silence to the test; silence puts man to the test,” really struck me. I lived in Hawaii for 10 years and during that time I didn’t have a radio in my vehicle and I can’t tell you how many times passengers were incredulous that I didn’t have one. Oftentimes I could literally feel their discomfort. Thank you for introducing me to Picard, I am ordering a copy of the book straightaway. Happy New Year to you and all your readers!
Welcome back indeed! I suspect like other subscribers/readers, in the spirit of conviviality, our support is precisely non-instrumental, non-transactional and in every other way diametrically opposite to commercial modes and values. Your absence/hiatus, like the "uselessness" of silence, hopefully also has had its important healing qualities.
This post, together with your previous one about darkness comes just a couple of days after I finished reading Ed Yong's An Immense World, a breathtaking, inspiring canvass of the dazzling, wondrous 'Umwelten' - sensory worlds - of non-human animals (and those of human animals to a degree as well). The final chapter of the book is titled, 'Save the Quiet, Preserve the Dark: Threatened Sensescapes', which, after 300 plus pages of sheer awe, humility, and enchantment, comes as a devastating jolt to the senses (so to speak) of the lesser-acknowledged harms wrought by technological-industrial modernity on the living world and ancient conditions - like silence and darkness - in conversation with which many of the extraordinary animal capacities celebrated in the book co-evolved. With regard to so-called noise pollution ('silence pollution'?), Yong writes, based on various recent studies, "Even the most heavily protected areas are under acoustic siege." and that "noise can degrade habitats that look otherwise idyllic, and make otherwise livable places unlivable. It can act as an invisible bulldozer that pushes animals out of their normal ranges. And where will they go? More than 83 percent of the continental United States lies within a kilometer of a road." The noise effects on aquatic ecosystems and beings of our mad globalized "getting and spending" and militarism et al. is just as bad. And it's all getting worse I'm afraid. Saving the quiet, and techno-industrial modernity are mutually exclusive, I'm afraid.
"[Hempton] says silence is an endangered species on the verge of extinction. He defines real quiet as presence — not an absence of sound but an absence of noise."
Welcome back! I hope your hiatus finds you doing well. It took me a while to make sense of "words that have passed through silence..". And then it hit to me: your other statement that words that come from other words are those come from exposure to our modern media environment. And such, words that pass through silence are those that come from reading and the silent contemplation of their meaning inside our heads. Good to have you back, 'till next time!
Welcome back LC! I recently read of studies that showed people were more likely to give themselves small electric shocks than sit with their own thoughts, undistracted, for 10 - 15 mins. Why are we so bothered by being alone with ourselves? I think the nature of the unconscious is relevant here, as it represents an undeniable part of us that we can never fully contact or control. The basic fact of the unconscious as such seems to make people very uncomfortable, and therefore eschew moments of silence and non-activity.
I too loved the piece on silence. Connections: I thought of Simon and Garfunkel's The Sound of Silence and then two poems, Auden's Sept 1 lines: "The lights must never go out. The music must always play. All the conventions conspire to make this fort assume the furniture of home, lest we should see where we are, lost in a haunted wood, children afraid of the night, who have never been happy or good." 2nd poem, Mark Strand's My Name
My Name
Once when the lawn was a golden green
and the marbled moonlit trees rose like fresh memorials
in the scented air, and the whole countryside pulsed
with the chirr and murmur of insects, I lay in the grass,
feeling the great distances open above me, and wondered
what I would become and where I would find myself,
and though I barely existed, I felt for an instant
that the vast star-clustered sky was mine, and I heard
my name as if for the first time, heard it the way
one hears the wind or the rain, but faint and far off
as though it belonged not to me but to the silence
I signed up for the newsletter a couple years back - read it when it comes - but have never been moved to comment. The extraordinary quality of this piece comes out of Silence and resonates more deeply than I can say. You touch spiritual practice, and contemplative practice here as an essential movement out of analysis into embodied reflective experience. So much of the wordiness and pace of our culture dehumanizes genuine experience and connection both interior and between persons. Back in 1934 Jung wrote of how dangerous a moment it is when technology outpaces our consciousness. Thank you for taking a pause, opening the door, and both entering and offering the profound gift of Silence.
Very pleased to see that you're back – please don't worry about the pace of your output. As others have said, it's actually part of the reason I subscribe.
I was struck by this passage: "Picard asserts that 'silence is the only phenomenon today that is "useless".' 'It does not fit into the world of profit and utility,' he continues, 'it simply is. It seems to have no other purpose; it cannot be exploited.'"
In the intervening years since he wrote this I think silence has certainly begun to fit into the world of profit, and has become exploited, most recently as part of 'wellness' (but surely prior to that, too). And the thing about current-day 'wellness' is that it's premised in large part on being a reaction to the noise of the internet-driven world – for those who can afford it (retreats, vacations, etc.). Silence is indeed a luxury – product.
Every word of this post had me saying “yes, yes, yes.” Just this week I was sitting at my desk pondering what practicing a year of silence would be like. It's not something I could do, practically, but it felt very appealing. The notion of words coming from other words and not from silence is a perfect articulation of how I have been experiencing both traditional and social media for some time now. It feels like assault. So much noise. Very glad you’re back. Thank you for shining some light out of darkness and some words out of silence.
It's odd. I am backwards. I pay to subscribe to those whose writing is important to me precisely because I don't want them fretting if they haven't published something. I want them to have my meager scrap in the meantime, for the day when they are ready to publish.
WELCOME BACK!
So great to see this! What a perfect reflection for the New Year. Your content is somewhat unique on my feed (I found you through Ezra Klein actually) which leans toward more...terrestrial stuff, but your absence has also made me realize that you’re a very unique and important source of insight and reflection for me. As for your absence - yeah, life happens. Be well. I’m not going anywhere.
I enjoyed this post immensely, (inspired me to become a subscriber). The quote, “Man does not put silence to the test; silence puts man to the test,” really struck me. I lived in Hawaii for 10 years and during that time I didn’t have a radio in my vehicle and I can’t tell you how many times passengers were incredulous that I didn’t have one. Oftentimes I could literally feel their discomfort. Thank you for introducing me to Picard, I am ordering a copy of the book straightaway. Happy New Year to you and all your readers!
You have absolutely been missed -- I was so grateful to see the notification of your writing, and even more grateful after reading. Happy new year!
Welcome back indeed! I suspect like other subscribers/readers, in the spirit of conviviality, our support is precisely non-instrumental, non-transactional and in every other way diametrically opposite to commercial modes and values. Your absence/hiatus, like the "uselessness" of silence, hopefully also has had its important healing qualities.
This post, together with your previous one about darkness comes just a couple of days after I finished reading Ed Yong's An Immense World, a breathtaking, inspiring canvass of the dazzling, wondrous 'Umwelten' - sensory worlds - of non-human animals (and those of human animals to a degree as well). The final chapter of the book is titled, 'Save the Quiet, Preserve the Dark: Threatened Sensescapes', which, after 300 plus pages of sheer awe, humility, and enchantment, comes as a devastating jolt to the senses (so to speak) of the lesser-acknowledged harms wrought by technological-industrial modernity on the living world and ancient conditions - like silence and darkness - in conversation with which many of the extraordinary animal capacities celebrated in the book co-evolved. With regard to so-called noise pollution ('silence pollution'?), Yong writes, based on various recent studies, "Even the most heavily protected areas are under acoustic siege." and that "noise can degrade habitats that look otherwise idyllic, and make otherwise livable places unlivable. It can act as an invisible bulldozer that pushes animals out of their normal ranges. And where will they go? More than 83 percent of the continental United States lies within a kilometer of a road." The noise effects on aquatic ecosystems and beings of our mad globalized "getting and spending" and militarism et al. is just as bad. And it's all getting worse I'm afraid. Saving the quiet, and techno-industrial modernity are mutually exclusive, I'm afraid.
The work of 'acoustic ecologist' Gordon Hempton might be of interest here as well. A great interview is here: https://onbeing.org/programs/gordon-hempton-silence-and-the-presence-of-everything/
"[Hempton] says silence is an endangered species on the verge of extinction. He defines real quiet as presence — not an absence of sound but an absence of noise."
Welcome back! I hope your hiatus finds you doing well. It took me a while to make sense of "words that have passed through silence..". And then it hit to me: your other statement that words that come from other words are those come from exposure to our modern media environment. And such, words that pass through silence are those that come from reading and the silent contemplation of their meaning inside our heads. Good to have you back, 'till next time!
I am happy to await the circumstances and the opportunity for you to post whenever able.
I’m simply grateful for your insights and clarity whenever you can write.
Welcome back Michael, and have a serene and serendipitous 2024.
I actually did wonder!
Welcome back LC! I recently read of studies that showed people were more likely to give themselves small electric shocks than sit with their own thoughts, undistracted, for 10 - 15 mins. Why are we so bothered by being alone with ourselves? I think the nature of the unconscious is relevant here, as it represents an undeniable part of us that we can never fully contact or control. The basic fact of the unconscious as such seems to make people very uncomfortable, and therefore eschew moments of silence and non-activity.
I too loved the piece on silence. Connections: I thought of Simon and Garfunkel's The Sound of Silence and then two poems, Auden's Sept 1 lines: "The lights must never go out. The music must always play. All the conventions conspire to make this fort assume the furniture of home, lest we should see where we are, lost in a haunted wood, children afraid of the night, who have never been happy or good." 2nd poem, Mark Strand's My Name
My Name
Once when the lawn was a golden green
and the marbled moonlit trees rose like fresh memorials
in the scented air, and the whole countryside pulsed
with the chirr and murmur of insects, I lay in the grass,
feeling the great distances open above me, and wondered
what I would become and where I would find myself,
and though I barely existed, I felt for an instant
that the vast star-clustered sky was mine, and I heard
my name as if for the first time, heard it the way
one hears the wind or the rain, but faint and far off
as though it belonged not to me but to the silence
from which it had come and to which it would go.
Mark Strand
The silence that you've given us between publications presented itself as an opportunity to go back and read your previous posts.
Silence is precisely that room that invites and affords conviviality.
Bravo!
I signed up for the newsletter a couple years back - read it when it comes - but have never been moved to comment. The extraordinary quality of this piece comes out of Silence and resonates more deeply than I can say. You touch spiritual practice, and contemplative practice here as an essential movement out of analysis into embodied reflective experience. So much of the wordiness and pace of our culture dehumanizes genuine experience and connection both interior and between persons. Back in 1934 Jung wrote of how dangerous a moment it is when technology outpaces our consciousness. Thank you for taking a pause, opening the door, and both entering and offering the profound gift of Silence.
On the topic of silence, this short homily is interesting: "On Silence" 4/5/2024 Etz Hasadeh
Zohar Atkins.
Very pleased to see that you're back – please don't worry about the pace of your output. As others have said, it's actually part of the reason I subscribe.
I was struck by this passage: "Picard asserts that 'silence is the only phenomenon today that is "useless".' 'It does not fit into the world of profit and utility,' he continues, 'it simply is. It seems to have no other purpose; it cannot be exploited.'"
In the intervening years since he wrote this I think silence has certainly begun to fit into the world of profit, and has become exploited, most recently as part of 'wellness' (but surely prior to that, too). And the thing about current-day 'wellness' is that it's premised in large part on being a reaction to the noise of the internet-driven world – for those who can afford it (retreats, vacations, etc.). Silence is indeed a luxury – product.
Every word of this post had me saying “yes, yes, yes.” Just this week I was sitting at my desk pondering what practicing a year of silence would be like. It's not something I could do, practically, but it felt very appealing. The notion of words coming from other words and not from silence is a perfect articulation of how I have been experiencing both traditional and social media for some time now. It feels like assault. So much noise. Very glad you’re back. Thank you for shining some light out of darkness and some words out of silence.