Silence and noise

Silence and Noise.

Input focuses our brain.  When we are driving and we get sleepy we turn up the music and switch over to rock.  When we can’t sleep we turn on something quiet.  When we are bored we watch TV.  When I am at work and bored I listen to audio books.  We take our iPods and our phones with us everywhere.  We have playlists for jogging and walking the dog and walking to the bus.  I keep a list in my hand at the grocery store and I’m surrounded by advertising, over head music plays to put me in a mood for spending.  We flip through magazines we read books outside on nice days.  

How often do we say no to the input and just let our brain think in its own direction without any focus to our attention?   I’m not talking about meditation.  Meditation is usually an intentional mode of consciousness to realize some benefit, aka focused.  I’m talking about just sitting in a quiet place and letting your mind wander.  Silence the input. 

I have been trying to do this for 30 min a day for the last week.  So far I have missed 2 days and had vastly different experiences each time.  My first reaction each day is to reach first for something to read, then I want to turn on the radio, at that point I will typically start talking to my dog.   I want to get up and do a chore, throw clothes in the washer, do a load of dishes, distract myself.  It feels like wasted time, I hate wasted time but I’ll get back to that later. It takes about 5 min to settle myself into the idea, and then I start thinking. 

Really thinking, actually thinking about my world, my job, my life, my needs, my wants, my fears, my behavior, how I affect others, how I react to others.  I’m not responding to input, I’m thinking. Some days this has been pleasant and restful.  Other days this has ushered in great emotional turbulence I had been avoiding.  Each and every time it has been valuable.  Things feel real and visceral in a way that they don’t the rest of the day.  It’s like walking out of a movie theater to meet the real world on a hot summer afternoon. The world is full of noise and I have turned it off. 

I love the noise. The noise lets me pretend my life is full. The noise makes it all feel important.  I don’t want to let go of the noise yet.  The noise is easy and my life is hard.  The noise is simple and my emotions are big and complicated.  I would rather just watch “How I Met Your Mother” and surf Facebook than spend time thinking about what I’ve let go of in my life and how hard it will be to get back.  I’m not ready to cancel cable and quit Facebook, but for 30 minutes a day I am trying to take in the silence.  I am reminding my brain of its original job and slowly working my way back into an intentional life.  The noise is bad for me.

I hate wasting time but it seems that is all I am ever doing.  When I am letting the input run my thoughts for me the input decides if I am entertained.  If the input is deciding for me how to think, how active am I being?  How can I consider any moment lived in when I’m barely awake for it? I want the world to feel real for me again.

These moments are dying in my hands and I’m doing what? …..on Facebook? 

This should be considered an exciting day.

I have an eye appointment to take my father to and we schedule an eye surgery for later in the month.

I get notice that his health insurance has been canceled.

Two of his prescriptions including one for his heart are being held by the pharmacy because the co-pay has gone from $25 to $650 and they want to make sure we intend to pay before releasing the meds.

I get a notice from the State of Oregon that my bond rider has gone up the $250,000, and I have to send in new paperwork.

I drive my sister to pick up her very first new car.

I pay 27 different bills out of 3 different check books, none of them mine.

My brother has been kidnapped by scientologists in Michigan and I have to get him back.

I decide to commit myself to a 5K run in 6 weeks.

This should be an exciting and stressful day for a normal human person. 

For me it was just Monday, Just another day.  They are all like this, filled with emergencies.  No wonder I can’t cook a healthy meal or get the laundry done.

On Wednesday I slept for 14.5 hours.  I shouldn't feel guilty about this but I do.  Just think of all the things I could have gotten done if I had been awake?

that sucking sound

If I was a part of a river I would be the sucking gurgling drowning sound part that comes with a whirlpool.

I keep picturing myself at the bottom of the river in toilet bowl rapid on the N. Umpqua.  On the bottom, under the water it was perfectly quiet except for the gentle swishing sound my hair made going in circles.  I hung there for a moment not panicked, just thinking about the situation.  I knew I was fine, but I also knew what was happening above me.  I knew I had to go up and deal with it.

I stretched out my legs and felt the round rocks on the bottom and pushed myself up.  When I broke the surface the world exploded again. It was so loud. There were people screaming with laughter and a little fear, guides were yelling to be heard over the din, my own voice directing a kid to the safety of the bank, the splashing of my limbs propelling me forward into the madness.  The most vivid sound was the whirlpool I had just come out of.  The sound pulled at every noise around it demanding it journey down to the bottom of the river, where it would have to be quiet.

Resolute

New years is one of my favorite holidays. I love the idea of new years resolutions and starting over.  I normally make a serious resolution to floss and then a giant list of things to attempt and fail at the rest of the year.  This year I didn’t even resolve to floss, it seems like too much work.  My dentist is going to be so disappointed. It doesn’t mean I don’t still have things I want to resolve.  I think my resolution is to not set myself up for failure this year.  Wait until I can handle it. 

I don’t have resolutions but I have lists. Giant lists. Lists with sub-lists. I even signed up for an account on a website that is just designed to help you keep track of your lists but I didn’t write it down on my list of websites and logins so I don’t remember what it is. They now have paint that dries as a dry erase board. I have seriously considered painting my whole office room with this stuff. I think that would give me a good start at keeping track of the list.  Right now all the different lists just keep running like a stock market ticker across the inside of my forehead.

I see these lists every time I close my eyes.  It is running as the constant third thoughts in my brain.  The first thought is what I’m actively working on, the second thoughts are the radio or tv or background noise in the environment, the third thoughts are these lists. They lay like blankets of fine grey mesh over everything I do.  Trying to sleep, the list whispers. Trying to work, the list reminds me that I have other work to do. Trying to relax, the list screams “wasting time!” I feel like Sisyphus.

Not all of the lists are bad.  Some give me hope for the future. These are the lists that I know I am going to ignore for a long time.  Lists for my house, vacations I want to take, garden ideas, stuff that means I am living in a world where I have my own time again.

I just can’t do resolutions right now.