Silence: Our greatest myth

Silence is nothing but a well advertised concept. Complete silence is, at best, a myth.

I say this knowing full well the criticisms and counter arguments that I will receive. Let us conduct a bit of an experiment, shall we? Try as hard as you can to remember the last time you can truly say you were in the presence of silence.

Try to think of a time when you could hear no sound. There was no humming of electronics. There was no clacking of shoes against concrete. There was no sound of your own breathing.

You cannot think of such a time because no such time exists.

The hippies of the world will argue that the world has turned its back on silence because it has forgotten the simplicities of life. Before all the technology and machines we were all perfectly capable of finding silence, they will say. This belief is in want for truth in at least fifty different ways in every possible universe. Simply put, it is nonsense.

But let us entertain the idea. Let us say, momentarily, that the world could conjure up silence before cars, phones and hair dryers existed. Let us imagine a world with nothing but human beings, their basic senses and the natural world. There is no language. No music. Is silence a part of it? Was silence ever a part of us? No it is not –and it never was.

You see, even if every animate thing in existence were to lose mobility the world would be anything but quiet. There would be the wind, dry leaves against tree trunks and raindrops landing in rivers (amongst other worldly things). It does not matter if you hike up onto the highest point of the Swiss Alps, you will never find silence.

Let us conduct another experiment. Go to the quietest place you know of. Hide yourself in the depths of stillness and cover your ears to the best of your ability. What do you hear? It is not “nothing” is it? You hear your heart beating. You hear what I have concluded is your blood running through your veins. You hear...even when you strive for silence.

Your body is an orchestra in itself. Nature is life’s choir. The world is a philharmonic mass. Silence is not golden, it simply isn’t. The word itself is loaded with noise, how do we expect its manifestation to be anything else?

Just Dance

Identity is a complex thing. Expressing the complexity of identity is nothing short of convoluted.

A few weeks ago, I had to construct a 3 minute contemporary performance piece that reflected the person that I think I am in nothing but movement. No music. No speech. No pen. Now I know that you are all probably thinking “3 minutes? This lazy midget”. But I urge you to try to dance 19 years in 3 minutes. Then come back to me.

Don’t worry, I’ll wait...

...

........

It’s not easy. It opens up your eyes to the fact that you know very little of yourself. It’s easy to write about the person that you think you are. It is easy to listen to a piece of music and make the conscious decision that it not only speaks to you but also defines you. Sketching your life in pencil across a blank page is simplicity defined.

But what happens when you have to negotiate yourself around a room in an attempt to find the exact points that will show the world the stages of your life? Panic, sweat, shortness of breath and, ultimately, tears –that’s what happens. Coming to the realisation that you do not know yourself at all shakes your world.

We underestimate the importance of the body as a form of expression. We walk around life’s dance floor in a haze of self importance. We disregard the most basic form of articulation the moment we become well learned in the social constructs we refer to as language. Moving is the most fundamentally human thing next to breathing, yet we know the least about it.

You walk before you speak, that much I know. So why is it that when I have to create movement I am stumped? I walk, I jump, I skip, I plank, I dance every weekend, I bop my head to music on a daily basis. So why exactly is it that I can’t move around a room for 3 minutes and show the masses who exactly I am? It’s a question that I cannot answer.

As I said, identity is a complex thing. Identity expressed through movement is somewhat impossible. But I have to do it. And so I will. It is the fact that I have to try so hard to do this that is a bother to me.

I should not have to learn how to negotiate my body to my soul. I should not have to trick my feet into abiding to my heart. Mind, body and soul should be able to work as one whenever I prompt them to. But because the mind has grown to govern the body and the soul has collapsed onto the mind, it takes me 2 hours to learn how to move for 3 minutes.