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Silence is increasingly rare in our noise-polluted world. What’s more, we often overlook its profound capacity to influence our lives, mostly for the better.
Each of us has a relationship with silence itself. For some, like Hannah, it is a refuge often sought but rarely found. Working as a retail manager, and then as a mom in the evening, she swims in a cacophony of noise. “I don’t remember the last time I experienced complete silence,” she told me.
She’s not alone. Research shows noise pollution has risen dramatically in recent decades, now reaching the point where many people don’t even know what it’s like to experience total quiet. Prior to the industrial revolution and, subsequently, the transportation revolution, the opposite was true. Silence was the norm, as was true throughout much of human evolution. Granted, not all sounds constitute noise. Many nature sounds and some music, for instance, prove soothing rather than corrosive. But intrusive sounds (those one does not want) are rampant for many.
“Last week, I drove over a hundred miles each way to attend a conference, and I never once listened to the radio. It wasn’t quiet, but it kept the noise down,” she said.
Hannah belongs to a group of folks who have hyperacusis, a heightened sensitivity to noise, particularly of the sudden or repetitive sort. Put someone of her ilk in a neighborhood with a constantly yipping dog or in a workplace that assaults the eardrums, and you have a recipe for temporary insanity. Noise can drive some of us bonkers. And, because most folks now live in urban or suburban environments, they often lack silent periods of any length. It’s not the best time in history to have hyperacusis.
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Kevin is the polar opposite. He compulsively seeks sound and finds silence oddly uncomfortable, even unnerving. He’s right at home in a bar with five TVs blaring and thumping background music. You know, the kind where you must shout your conversations.
“Sometimes I’ll wake up at night, and it’s pretty still. To get back to sleep, I have to turn on some music or the TV,” Kevin told me.
“What would happen if you didn’t?” I asked.
“I’ve tried it before, and it feels weird to me.”
In contrast, Hannah sometimes intentionally wakes up in the middle of the night, enjoys some quiet time, and then returns for a few hours of sleep. It’s the only way she can satisfy her need to lower life’s volume.
Too Much Noise
Noise pollution is no laughing matter. Research shows folks who work and live in noisy environments have elevated rates of hypertension, heart disease, distractibility, accidents, anxiety, irritability, sleep disturbances and a host of other physical, cognitive and emotional disturbances. Impacts on children can include diminished academic performance, including delayed reading and language development. Also, there is growing evidence human-generated noise harms other animals, particularly birds, whales, dolphins and bats, all species in decline.
Some folks may relish noise, but, in most cases, their bodies and psyches do not. What’s more, as was true with Kevin, many who are uncomfortable with silence use sound to distract themselves from feeling bored, agitated, worried or depressed.
This aversion to silence is more common among those who spend many hours each day glued to screens—smartphones, computers, TVs, tablets, etc. These devices are primary sound generators at home and work, essentially addicting the brain to all-but-constant input, much of it auditory as well as visual. Such folks use ambient sound to self-medicate for the anxiety and restlessness silence brings them.
Finally, noise interrupts necessary periods of just being, of quiet contemplation, meditation, journaling and prayer, undermining one’s spiritual development. Cultivating a rich spiritual life, as well as hearing one’s own inner voice, proves far more difficult when the outer world is incessantly screaming.
Confucius said, “Silence is a true friend.”
But, increasingly, it’s a friend that’s hard to come by.
