Silent meditation is one part of my life entirely distinct from everything else. This post is about what it has meant and done for me.

It has been during meditation that I have come to know myself, good and bad,  and understand myself in a way that has impacted every part of my life:

In meditation, I radically reduced my anxiety, diluted my anger, figured out how to do good, and helped me accept aging gracefully and meaningfully.

Those are no small accomplishments. I am no saint and do not have a perfect life, but I have a rich and meaningful one. I credit my spiritual life for much of that.

I have a friend who is sick, and he is frightened and weary from being up half the night worrying about the upcoming surgery and the pain in his body.

His doctor recommended meditating, but my friend dismissed it. It wasn’t for him, he said.

I also suggested meditation, but I knew he wouldn’t meditate.

I could tell by the reluctant way he asked about it and was disinterested. He sounded like me before I tried it.

I dropped the subject.

I have learned never to push that sort of advice on other people; it’s okay if they make different choices than I make. In my case, I tried it when I was ready and was desperate enough for a new idea to get through difficult times and salvage the rest of my life.

Meditation has been essential to me and has done me incalculable good. But I had to do it when I was ready, not when someone else told me. Meditation is all about self-awareness, and it is not simple or easy. It can be harrowing at times to get to know yourself.

Getting to know myself was a double-edged sword, at best.

I learned once again that I do not know what is best for other people; I can barely discern it for myself.

I have often been guilty of this preaching, the arrogant idea that my values and choices are suitable for other people. and that I know what is best for them.

I got my comeuppance in recent years as my blog became popular.

I was deluged with messages and demands from people telling me their stories and insisting that I follow their advice and relate to their experiences.

Quite often, they get angry when they are ignored or disobeyed.

I have learned that this country is losing its grip on the American idea that people should make their way and reach their own conclusions.

We love the labels and tags – “red, blue, woke” – that keep us from thinking for ourselves.

The day after we talked, my friend sent me a brief message saying meditation didn’t work for him.  Perhaps a little bit, he added. I said I was backing away, but that meditation wasn’t a pill to take, it took some work.

He said he might be interested in the pre-meditation breathing I talked about, but I don’t think he was interested in that either, and he never called to ask about it.

At first, I felt disappointed that he didn’t want to meditate in the way I had,  but I caught myself. People love being heroes, but it isn’t always helpful.

I’d suggested it because he is a friend and was struggling, but that is the boundary. I won’t mention it again unless he asks me for help. And I don’t blame him in the least for his decision.

As one who is teaching meditation to the elderly residents of the Mansion and others, I know better than to push it on anyone.

That is anything but helpful.

Because I do something and like something, that doesn’t give me the right to preach to others about it. I share my experiences in the hope they might be helpful; that is as far as I go.

When I got used to meditating, I saw myself all too clearly, and one of the things I saw was that I often preached on behalf of the things I have learned and the lessons I have benefited from.

That’s a bad habit to get into and a hard one to break. But I think I’ve broken it.

When I started to meditate, I became aware of all the things I had read about silence in my readings and contemplations about spirituality.

Over the years, I hadn’t paid much attention to silence; my life never seemed to allow the time for it.

I saw it as a luxury, an indulgence,   a trend for the idle, rich, and goo-goos of the holistic world.

I was too important, too busy.

I remembered reading the writings of Theologian Blaise Pascal, who said of silence, “all a person’s miseries derive from not  being able to sit in a quiet room alone.”

Thomas Merton wrote: “It is not speaking that breaks our silence,  but the anxiety to be heard. The words of the proud man impose silence on all others so that he alone may be heard. The humble man speaks only to be spoken to.”

Before Merton called it “meditation,” it was known as “contemplation,” something only the profoundly religious did. Meditation is out in the world now, secular and religious.

“In a world of noise, confusion, and conflict,” wrote Merton, “it is necessary that there be places of silence, inner discipline, and peace in such places love can blossom.”

Merton also wrote that the “world of men has forgotten the joys of silence and the peace of solitude, which is necessary for the fullness of human living.”

Meditation was a big deal for me.

It was the entree to spiritual wisdom and understanding, the beginning of interior peace, the first step to self-control, humility, and the dissolution of panic as a driving force in my life.

Joan Chittister writes that the monastics realized that silence is the link to the divine; however, we each define it. Merton agreed that spiritual life and peace of mind are impossible without silence.

I didn’t realize it was simple and that there was no right or wrong. You just sat in a quiet, comfortable place and let your mind and soul reveal themselves.

The 20 minutes I carve out for myself every morning of my life (while in a favorite chair or sometimes in bed) is not a luxury or indulgence; it is the foundation for building a life that meditation helped shape.

I alone define what I want in my spiritual life; only silence can take me there.

The first thing that happens is that silence slows my heartbeat a bit. Breathing helps to calm and focus me.

After a month, my mind sank into a sense of oneness with my life.

I found that silence changed me. It is so different from the din of the outside world, and it is almost instantly transformative.

If we cultivate meditation, says Chittister, it will put down roots in our souls and engender peace in our lives.

It will give us a healthy way to deal with the ideas that occupy and often irritate and distract us.

In meditation, I became a spiritual person, as flawed as I am. The best way I can describe silence and meditation is that it leads me down into the center of my soul toward a life of calm,  meaning, happiness, and freedom from fear.

You don’t need a church, chapel, or bible, only your mind and memories. You don’t need a priest or rabbi or Iman to meditate.

Meditation taught me to be fearless about accepting myself and standing up for my identity.

Silence isn’t acquiesced or surrender; it’s quite the opposite.

I learned for the first time that I am worth fighting for, especially in a world where strangers feel entitled to tell me who I am.

I found that this silence brought me closer to the truth, the seeing and facing up to the reality of me, who I was, and who I wanted to be.

It helped me become more authentic, a process very much underway and will never be finished.

Silence is not a miracle pill; it doesn’t make me a saint or even an especially good person. I’m not better than anyone.

Being the best person I can be is the work I have to do on my own, in my way, and mostly outside of the silence.

When I think about it, I don’t know if meditation would benefit my friend; truthfully, it is not my business. I don’t know if it’s suitable for everyone else or even anyone else.

One of the things I came to understand in silence is that this work is mine. It belongs to me. It’s not something I can give to anyone else or prescribe for anyone else, or surrender to anyone else.

The modern world is hopefully beginning to grasp the effects of so much noise, anger, and violence.

Still, there is little discussion or examination of the potential effects of silence, perhaps the only real antidote to contemporary life’s constant roar, rattle, argument, and shouting.

“Down in the depths of silence, distant from the crowds, ” writes Chittister, “alone with yourself, your life lays itself bare before you, begging to be seen. All the tensions swim to the surface noiselessly, although  you have spent weeks – sometimes years – trying to ignore the need to deal with them: to have the conversations, or see the people you do not want to see, to do the new work, to confront difficulties, or to summon up the courage to start over.”