I’m in Silence

“Your treasure — your perfection — is within you already. But to claim it, you must leave the busy commotion of the mind and abandon the desire of the ego and enter into the silence of the heart…” Eat Pray Love

After dozens of times, I watched Eat, Pray, Love again a couple days ago. I love rewatching movies, especially those with an awesome message. I still enjoy this particular movie due to the heartfelt messages that are still useful with my current situation. In the midst of worldly confusions, it’s a good reminder to show me that every conflict has the way out.

It’s a story about a woman named Liz, who traveled to some countries, searching for the meaning of life. She came to Italy to raise up her passion in culinary, then she came to India to find peace inside her heart, and then she went to Bali to find the meaning of love. We are following her healing journey with many great messages in each destination.

My favorite part in her journey is when she came to India to retreat or meditate. India, as you know, is a very beautiful, festive, and yet, noisy country. Imagine being in India to meditate in the middle of heat and crowd noises as your background music. In my mind, it’s impossible! How can somebody stay calm and not be bothered with external factors and moreover, their inner thoughts? Though Liz struggled to find her inner peace at first, she did not give up, until she came over those initial problems and found peace. Eventually, she bought a “I’m in silence” badge, to show her commitment in silence.

Nowadays, the situations have become similar to that. The world now is full of noises, crowds, and topics about pandemic have become our daily consumption. It’s barely hard to stay still and smile, and find our inner peace in our heart. It’s hard to not feel scared and worried about what happens around us.

After I watched the movie, the world seems like a wild ocean and I’m in a boat hypnotized by the sound of the waves. I ask myself, ‘is this the life that i want? Or am I just part of the crowd in this world? When was the last time I listened to myself? Or this world is too noisy so I talk more than I listen?’. And that was the night that I considered, just like Liz in the movie, decided to listen to my own heart and find my inner peace.

Abu Hurairah narrated that Prophet Muhammad SAW said,

“Whoever believes in God and the Last Day should speak a good word or remain silent.”

I found this profound hadith that night. In my religion, silence is golden, and it’s not your weakness, instead it’s your strength. One of the great leaders in Islam, Ali bin Abi Talib, noted that someone who speaks less often actually embodies more wisdom. And according to Talib’s teachings, when you’re quiet, you avoid unnecessary talk that might lead to lying. Because our tongue is our boomerang, it can be either useful or harmful. We’ve all been there, we start speaking without a plan and end up saying things we don’t mean to say. Silence not only protects us from sins, but also prevents us from hurting people.

I’m a writer, it’s funny how I talk about silence when words are my passion. However, just like speaking, we can decide to write only good words or not writing anything. After staying still for a while I realised that I spent most of the time on social media everyday. I took photos, shared videos, read funny and bad comments, etc. And it’s wasting my time. Meanwhile, I should be more productive in writing because it is a part of my dream list, but I forgot. I drift on the noise of the world so I can’t listen to the voice inside my heart.

I decided to hibernate from social media for a month. And I’m planning to speak more good things and write more useful writings. I believe that if I substitute my time on social media with learning something new, writing, and being more present in my prayer, I’ll become a better person insyaallah… May Allah SWT bless us with the wisdom that is acquired through silence, and give us the ability to think before we speak. Ameen.

Our words are the mirror of our heart. Choose wisely :)

Regards,

-RG-