Thursday Thought – One Square Inch of Silence

Note: Each Thursday I will post a little something to inspire us to finish the week strong. These Thursday Thoughts will be a quote, poem, piece of music, artwork, or inspirational video.  Congratulations, you made it over the hump and let’s finish the week together.

This past week on the On Being Podcast (highly recommended), I listened to a thought-provoking session with Gordon Hempton.  He is an Acoustic Ecologist with a lifetime focus on recording the natural sounds around us.  He is racing time as true, natural quiet spots on Earth are disappearing. Human societies and our related noise encircles the Earth.  True quiet places where we can fully experience silence are disappearing.

Silence is not absence. Silence is presence.  The presence of the natural world around us.  With silence we remove ourselves from the noise of modern human society.

I invite you to read more on the work of Gordon Hempton.  There is more at the On Being website and he also has a book, One Square Inch of Silence.  This term refers to a concept of protecting just one square inch of space from all human generated noise.  From that center, truly we need miles and miles of silent space to maintain the quiet in that one square inch.

Once again, thought-provoking.  Here is a short video for a film of the work by Gordon Hempton.  Find a quiet space and do watch, think, and react.