An Ode to Silence

The power of quieting internal – and external – noise.

Prefer to listen? Click play on the audio track above to hear SVB read you these words.

And don’t forget your Reflection Points at the end.

“Perhaps we need to wake up to the fact that our cries about a lack of inspiration and hope in this world are directly tied to the way we are living.”

LAST SUNDAY, I – along with nearly 125 million other people – took part in the distinctly American tradition of watching the Super Bowl. And for the first time in as long as I can remember, my husband and I did this not at a party or in someone else’s home, but in ours.

With pizza and in sweats.

It was heaven.

And as we sat there watching the game and assessing the commercials, I caught myself doing something that has become so synonymous with modern living that it was remarkable that I even noticed it was happening:

After every major play, poignant ad or celebrity citing, I found myself consulting the plastic box in my hand to see what the world was saying.

<Programming note: “Plastic box” is the term my father-in-law disdainfully uses to refer to our phones.>

Numbers indicate I wasn’t alone.

During the halftime show (you know the one) the social media platform X literally crashed due to a high volume of traffic. So many people had something to say (or, like me, were just there for the comments), even Musk’s technology couldn’t handle the load.

So there we were – watching one network while chiming in and perusing multiple others.

Simultaneously.

Never fully present in any particular one.

Which is why this – this constant multi-tasking between channels – is what I like to refer to as “noise.”

Because it’s important to note that a lot of the noise in our lives these days doesn’t even come with any sound.