Just as each new seed requires a period of gestation -- a time of deep silence and solitude -- so, too, we need such seasons. "Someone wrote me recently and asked if it wasn't frustrating to have exterior solitude interrupted. Well, you learn to live out of your interior solitude. And perhaps this is one of the keys to living in the madness, the telescoping demands and resulting exhaustion of our society: to explore our own interior solitude and learn not only to be afraid of it but to live out if its self-discipline, its limitless resources and deep silence. Solitude is like a tea ceremony, the celebration of life in all its homely movements taken out of time -- the wonder of the commonplace, the mystery of ordinary life ... Solitude is being poured-out-through. We evolve toward simplicity. We dwell in the Word."
What is the source of thought? Such a demanding question, the mind wants to go to sleep. It requires an enormous and penetrating effort. What is the source of meaning? There is a silence that does not have to be conjured, doesn't require attainment. Nothing you can do to bring it about. It's there constantly. It is the source of everything. Look into silence for a moment. You can touch this silence with your belly. You can touch this silence with your whole being. There is no more fear. Silence is the meaning. Listen to the chatter of your brain. Only echoes. Look deeply into the valley from which those echoes resonate. Listen to the valley itself, the silence. It is here that true function is revealed.