From a psychological point of view, silence is more than the absence of sound. It is a singular mental space. Listening to your inner voice is impossible when newsfeeds, notifications, and the infinite scroll of social media constantly address you and seize your attention.
Rather than fearing silence as emptiness—which many people dread—you can shift perspective to see it as an essential mental nutrient brimming with possibility.
There is a reason why yoga and meditation aim to distance body and mind from the everyday buzz: A caesura—to borrow the musical term for a pause—is good for your neurological health and mental well-being.
One meditation aid is a kōan. A famous kōan reads: “Two hands brought together make a sound. What is the sound of one hand clapping?” The more your intellect tries to solve it, the farther it pushes an answer away. Sōtō Zen, the Serene Reflection School of Buddhism, says, “Just sitting is the essence of pure Zen.” Just sitting with eyes open, trying neither to think nor not to think (closing the eyes invites daydreaming), is the natural kind of silence that constitutes an essential nutrient.
States of absence and nonoccurrence are both physical and mental. Yet we are more likely to notice when........