Being Present in Silence

All the silence in the world cannot give us what we want, because silence by itself is void. We must bring presence into that silence, presence that accompanies us in our search and in our stillness.

There are two types of presence. The first is presence with ourselves. How many times our blindness to simple things about ourselves keep us from an intimate relationship with God. It's not that we have failed to change. It is that we have failed to recognize our brokeness, our need for healing, the woundedness in our soul. Recognizing it is the first step toward healing.

The second presence we must develop is the Divine presence. We have that presence with us. We just do not allow ourselves to sit with it enough to become vividly aware of it. We think we must sit in a church, or a solitary place conducive to lifting the mind and heart to God. But God is within. You need not lift so much as open.

Being present allows us to be there to experience. It means our eyes are open and our hearts are listening. It means we are discerning more than looking, intuiting rather than surmising. It means that we have stepped down into the level of consciousness that sees below the surface and knows without having to be told.

Let us bring silence into our Lenten practices. And let us enter into that silence fully awake, fully aware, and with presence.