Heard Only In Silence

"I live in the woods out of necessity. I get out of bed in the middle of the night because it is imperative that I hear the silence of the night, aloud, and with my face on the floor, say psalms, alone, in the silence of the night... The silence of the forest is my bride and the sweet dark warmth of the whole world is my love and out of the heart of that dark warmth comes the secret that is heard only in the silence..."

~ Thomas Merton

I have written in this blog previously about being more sensitive and psychically aware in the middle of the night and wee hours of morning. Many of us on this path are. The Divine speaks to me more clearly in these hours, when most of the work-a-day world is sleeping. In the relative silence of that time, I am better able to observe the world around me. The other evening there were seven deer just outside my window,driven by hunger to feast on the acorns fallen from the oak not more than 10 feet from the building. In the silence I watched six of them walking about on long, graceful legs before being joined by a magnificent buck. His antler rack was so large that it cast a shadow across the ground from the street lights. We sat together in the darkness and  silence for at least a quarter hour,  connected by simply being. I consider it my Yule present from Nature.

The old saying is that "silence is golden". I say silence is a gift. It is Peace and Tranquility and the place we go inward to dream and renew our soul. While it is the place I believe we are closest to the Immanent Divine, it also the place where we meet our demons. One always seems to be in proximity

of the other, and without silence and discernment, it is difficult to know which we are dealing with, which is why examination of the self was a part of these long, dark nights for our ancestors.

The late mystic Thomas Merton speaks of the secret that is heard only in silence; to him silence was the voice of God. And despite changing definitions, I believe it still is exactly that. Silence holds space and fills it with possibilities. Silence fills that space with love and even more of what bonds us as human beings to one another and all other creatures. It is in this silence that we hear the murmurings of Earth and the crack of the spark of Life.

We no longer fear the darkness of this time of year as our ancestral tribe once did ( speaking from the First World, because this is still a very real threat in the Third World.) I believe we should listen within the silence, embrace it, and celebrate what it teaches.

And with that I wish you a Blessed Solstice wherever you are, a Joyous Yule, and a Merry Christmas- whatever speaks to your heart.