Stop for a moment as you read this. How many things are going on in your environment, RIGHT NOW? Is the TV on? Music? A conversation in progress? Are you petting your dog? Baking some gluten free cookies? Or naughty you…are you at a red light? How much is going on in your world at this very moment?
We have become numb to the amount of stimuli present in our everyday lives. If you watch one of the sports or news stations, not only do you have the game or the reporter on screen, but you have one and often two by-lines of subtext scrolling somewhere on the screen as well. In the gym the other day, I noticed a person who was walking on the treadmill, headphones on, TV on and reading the newspaper. I thought, “Wow…can this person add anything else into the mix to completely distract themselves from the actual physical activity?”.
It’s so common, we don’t perceive it as being an issue. We’re plugged into our devices, that are smaller and more accessible than ever. We have added another layer onto all else that we do. My question is, why?
Partially, I think it’s because this is what most people are doing. It seems normal to be disconnected, so we don’t have the awareness that we’re participating. Our culture has led us to believe that silence isn’t desirable. When we step into an experience where there is little distraction from simply being present, we often find it startling.
When we visited the Baha’i House of Worship, also known as “Lotus Temple” in Delhi, India, people were instructed to remain silent once inside the temple. As we entered and found a seat in one of the many long wooden pews there was a rustle of human activity and once people settled down, we were bathed under a vast dome of relative silence. Even after being thoroughly instructed to remain silent, many people couldn’t resist the temptation to whisper something to another person. They would then be signaled to “hush” by a volunteer who would make eye contact and place prayer-like hands at their own mouths as a reminder. We sat for quite some time and we could feel a definite shift away from being over-stimulated by the densely populated city and into a sanctuary of calm.
My thought of the week is to see, even in our own busy lives, if we can peel away some of the extra layers and seek our own sanctuary. If you watch a talented juggler handling multiple balls at one time, they are still only doing one thing. Juggling. If you feel you’re juggling too many things at a time, see if there is one thing to let go of in order to point your compass into a direction that is more calm. Letting go of a multi-tasking and distracting mind-set can lead us to a sense of openness and freedom, just as we found within the silent temple.
