“You have a grand gift of silence, Watson,” said he. “It makes you quite invaluable as a companion.”
— Arthur Conan Doyle, 1891
Twenty-four years ago this morning, history changed forever as the first of four commercial airplanes crashed within minutes of each other in downtown Manhattan , a field in rural Pennsylvania, and miliary headquarters in Washington, DC.
News coverage — in those years before social media — was wall to wall, with anchors and pundits giving us an endless stream of play-by-play commentary.
But it was the late ABC News anchor Peter Jennings, widely known and respected for his ability to calmly cover live events, who took a different approach with his team, as he later recounted:
“We went into silent mode. It was not necessary for us to add our own anxiety or shock. I have always been conscious that there are times when some people on TV talk too much. Silence or natural sound on occasion is infinitely more powerful and relevant.”
“Silence is one of the great arts of conversation.” — Marcus Tullius Cicero
Answers in the Silence
Leaders of consequence understand this truth. Abraham Lincoln, by temperament a listener more than a lecturer, is remembered for words saved and hoarded, as if they were coins to be spent only in necessity. His silences in council, maddening to his generals, forced them to hear themselves think.
The best leaders understand they are not expected to have all of the answers, but rather serve to help others discover the answers in themselves. “I alone can fix it” is not only a terrible lie, but a declaration that listening to others is a meaningless endeavor.
In order to learn, we must take information in. To take information in, we must adopt a more taciturn manner.
Kahlil Gibran laid out the matter plainly in The Prophet:
“You talk when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts;
And when you can no longer dwell in the solitude of your heart you live in your lips, and sound is a diversion and a pastime.
And in much of your talking, your thinking is half murdered.
For thought is a bird of space, that in a case of words may indeed unfold its wings but cannot fly.
There are those among you who seek the talkative through fear of being alone.
The silence of aloneness reveals to their eyes their naked selves and they would escape.
And there are those who talk, and without knowledge or forethought reveal a truth which they themselves do not understand.
And there are those who have the truth within them, but they tell it not in words.
We seem to be always running to one thing or another—and in some cases, running from ourselves.”
What Gibran saw as a plague of words a century ago has metastasized into today’s epidemic of notifications, posts, podcasts, and panels, with constant commentary about every latest development running as a perpetual soundtrack that protects us from solitude and its unmarketable wisdom.
“I will begin to speak when I have that to say which had not better be unsaid.” — Cato the Younger
To choose silence, then, is an act of resistance as much as it is a form of courtesy. It grants the people around us the rare privilege of hearing themselves and grants us the ability to listen to them.
The practice requires discipline — letting our screens go dark to free our minds to drift into the slow eddies of their own currents. But it is in those quiet backwaters, not in the cataracts of commentary, that wisdom takes shape.
As Cato knew, the words worth saying are few, and the silence in which they are born is vast.
There’s so much to learn,
P.S.
For those interested in learning more, check out our archives on Listening and Reflection.
I love your writing, Scott. Thank you.
“Not in the cataracts of commentary” is such good use of language to make your point. My first read article today was on thinking less- presence without performance. The point in meditation is to quiet the thoughts while being in touch with our embodiment and our unlimitedness in being present. Your communication is so timely. I loved the response of Peter Jennings being brought up today. So much outrage expressed today when it seems only outrageous when the person being murdered shares our points of view or is in the same “tribe”. I’m thinking of the hateful lies told when Paul Pelosi was attacked in his home with a hammer that seriously harmed him. Where was the outrage from all law abiding citizens? Seems people pick and choose what outrages them into commentary without having a consistent principle as a guiding force. Integrity is so rare in those compelled to comment. Even those professing to be Christians fail to follow their master’s teaching when they wish inequality for women and non- white people. I guess they missed Jesus’s skin color as well as his core tenents. I’m very sad today and appreciated your upliftment of wisdom expressed.