Don't think that those who enter the silence of God are "silent". Nothing could be farther from the truth! Silence is a thunder! You will be able to hear it everywhere. Your nights and days will be filled with it. ...Many confuse silence with solitude. Solitude is being alone with God, waiting for God. But silence is an immense sea into which you enter and never leave. And once you have plunged into this silence, you will always be silent.
This is how we are: we fall in love with each other's strengths, but love deepens towards permanence when we fall in love with each other's weaknesses.
~ Salman Rushdie in THE GOLDEN HOUSE