Silence. Many people cannot stand even a moment of quiet.
They turn the TV on before the quiet can be noticed by their minds. Some have
nonstop involvement with the computer or the game console. Some will say that
they hate the quiet. But it is so good and healthy for the brain to have times
when outside noise isn’t bombarding it.
The brain needs time to process the stimuli it has absorbed
for hours in a day. Often this processing occurs at night while sleeping. It
also takes place during daytime moments of quiet involving loose wanderings of
thought. I grew up in a manner which allowed such moments to occur naturally. I
lived in a rural setting. During the summer, I could find myself sitting at the
edge of the man-made stream running through our property for irrigation of the
farming land all around. There, I might pick up a stick to scratch and dig at
small rocks in the dirt. I would watch ants busily making their way. My cat
would wander up, brush against me, and receive my petting. A breeze would go
through our Aspen trees causing the leaves to make a sort of light, waterfall
type of sound. My parents did not worry that I was spending too much time on
some electronic device. We didn’t have anything but a TV which we watched in
the evening. Sometimes I would lie on the couch or on the floor in the living
room just soaking up the sun coming through the window.
Quiet is often a comfort for me. So it puzzles me when I
encounter people who are bothered by it; they seem even to be afraid of it. For
health of mind and body, it would be a benefit for people to learn to enjoy
times of quiet. The body needs regular relaxation to counter the effects of
daily stress. The brain needs time to rejuvenate, sort information, store it
into memory, and to physically repair. Problem solving and creative ideas come
out of a brain that is allowed to process without focus or pressure. When we
make ourselves think, we use known information in standard ways we have learned
or been taught. When we let the brain percolate and make connections on its
own, unique ideas can spring up.
These days, mindfulness has become a process encouraged for
a number of benefits. It certainly is a way to fully attend to the moment,
taking in sensations we might miss due to constant busyness and non-stop evaluative
thinking. Mindfulness lets us experience a moment such as the sound of a
bumblebee on a flower nearby. We can choose to set aside time for practicing
mindfulness. But the randomness of a wandering mind is also healthy. We can
choose to allow for unstructured time in which we allow our mind to do what it
will. This is the kind of time in which people complain of boredom. Instead of
fearing and avoiding boredom, learn to enjoy one’s own mind playing with a
daydream or remembering an amusing moment or curiously wondering about
something in the world. Put down the phone, step away from the game, and just
be. Try it for just five minutes. Or enjoy a walk for physical health with the added
benefit of free thinking. These days, we have to make the decision to give
ourselves unstructured time. In order to do that, we need to see the value in
it.
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