Awakening the Buddha Within _ Eight Steps to Enlightenment - Lama Surya Das [89]
THE BEAUTIFUL SOUND OF SILENCE
When I participated in my first ten-day Vipassana retreat in India, what impressed me most was the Buddhist practice known as Noble Silence. No speech, no sign language, no radios, no television, no newspapers, no books, no notes, notebooks, or tape recorders. Even though we sat in the meditation hall and ate together, there were no interpersonal relationships or interactions—except for the most basic shared sense of being there together in the simplest, most stripped-down and exposed-to-one’s-own-gaze sort of way. Quieting the heart, mind, energy, and mouth. Then, during the 1980s, when I did two back-to-back three-year, three-month, three-day Tibetan Buddhist retreats in Dordogne, France, we practiced Noble Silence for six months at a time, avoiding even eye contact, which would have been considered an interpersonal interaction and thus a lapse in the silence. This extended period of Noble Silence, which furthers the sense of spiritual solitude or existential aloneness, was the most intense and fulfilling part of that long, intensive meditation retreat.
In such an intensive practice period, at first the initial sense of relief and quietude is, naturally enough, combined with missing one’s habitual talking and sharing of experiences with friends; one also misses study, poetry and journal writing, as well as sending letters and cards. But as the mirror of silence and solitude deepens, one starts to understand what scriptures mean when reminding us to see the Pure Land, or Buddha Field, nirvana—the radiant perfection—in everything, right here and now. “This land where we stand is the Pure Land, paradise; this body the body of Buddha,” as Japanese Zen master Hakuin sang.
Ancient Tibetan teachings describe a creative imagination-cum-visualization practice, which consists of learning to hear all sounds as mantra, recognize all beings as Buddhas and dakinis, and perceive all thoughts as creative displays of innate wisdom. Noble Silence helps the practitioner transform his or her ordinary limited self-image and recognize the natural state of great perfection—no matter what the environment. This is why awakened masters, who have inwardly transformed their perception, seem to carry their own atmosphere with them wherever they go. Theirs is like another reality, another dimension, right here in this world, but not entirely of it.
Noble Silence, which does not necessarily have to be for extended periods of time, is an excellent way to quiet our habitual busy bodies and overactive rational minds while becoming more receptive, self-reflective, and sensitive. Think about what it means to take a vow of silence for a short period of time; like one day or even a half day, for example, your own personal time of rest. Consider an outer and inner silence that is not broken by the continual static of talk, mental chatter, and interpersonal dynamics. For that period of time, by design, commune only with yourself; for that time, stop asking of others, and ask only of yourself. During Noble Silence, we stop discussing and negotiating; instead we pray and attend only to the present; we chant and sing, opening ourselves to other dimensions of our being. We can just do nothing—just show up as it were—and see what happens.
Sublime solitude and genuine inner silence is far from lonely. Milarepa, the eleventh-century Tibetan poet and cave-dwelling hermit sage, found that this solitary life in the Himalayas was true completeness. He sang:
When I am alone meditating in the mountains,
my guru is always present;
All the Buddhas are always with me.
THE JOY OF SILENCE, SOLITUDE,