Sometimes It’s Better To Take A Deep Breath And Keep Quiet

They say that silence is the art that feeds wisdom, so sometimes there is no choice but to make use of it to respond correctly, so as not to continue with conversations and events that are not worth it. Breathing deeply and staying quiet at certain times is the best option we can take.

It is curious how those who have been working in psychotherapy for many years  often see in the client’s own silence a considerable advance in the healing process. For many it can be somewhat contradictory since therapy is built with a powerful exchange through the word. Thus, the medium is that dialogue that acts as an energy that confronts, deepens, awakens and reconstructs.

However, that sudden silence, in which the person is silent for a moment and takes a breath, often marks a crucial moment. It is when you become fully aware of your emotions, it is when you realize something that until now you had not perceived. It is, also, when the person is more focused than ever when harmonizing thoughts and emotions, and the past, is left aside to focus authentically on the present moment.

Silence sometimes acts as an awakening of consciousness, and that is something exceptional. Not only does it help us to better manage conversations or specific situations, it is also a channel where we can make contact with ourselves to stop “doing” for a moment and simply “be”.

We are therefore facing a subject with interesting nuances and curious aspects that can be of great help to us on a day-to-day basis. .

The mental noise, the noise that surrounds us and devours us

We live in the culture of noise. We are not referring precisely to the pressure of ambient sound, the persistent purr of traffic, the perpetual hum of factories or the echo of large cities that never sleep. We are talking about mental noise, that uproar of conflicting emotions. A mental cacophony that not only causes us to stop listening to whoever is in front of us, but also often causes us to stop listening to ourselves.

We are influenced by a type of communication where the enthusiastic voice, the one that screams and leaves no pauses, is the one that triumphs. We see it in our politicians, we see it in many of our work meetings, wherever. In fact, the essayist and journalist 

Conversations are often assembled through phrases and words that do not pass through an adequate mental or emotional filter. We forget that managing language and words is also the art of intelligence, where silence is often a necessary crossing point.

. So let us understand that there is nothing wrong with taking a breath and staying quiet in the middle of a conversation. Perhaps what we say after that break is the solution to the problem or the key to recovering our relationship.

Keeping quiet and giving silence can be a punishment

George Bernard Shaw said that ” silence is the most perfect expression of contempt . ” Thus, we must be very careful in how we use it, in how we apply it depending on the context and the people receiving this silence. So far, we have made it clear that the use of silence is a perfect tool to manage our own emotions, to focus on the here and now and thus be able to emit a more accurate response or type of action.

The entrepreneur, researcher and lecturer Luis Castellanos talks about this same topic in his book “The science of positive language”. Silence is a pause for ourselves. Keeping quiet is necessary, for example, when we come home from work and are about to go home. Something as simple as taking a deep breath and being silent for a few seconds can take away the pressure and anxiety of that other context that we should not project at home.

Now, something that would be good to take into account is that silence can often act as a curtail of the quality of our personal relationships. It is the words that educate, it is the words that heal and they help us build bridges, create roots and consolidate our bonds through a positive, empathetic and close language.

Hence, we must be very clear that  silence is not a positive punishment for any child, that any bad act, mischief or nonsense is not solved by withdrawing the word or denying him the loneliness of his room. With this, what we often do is feed anger. In these cases, communication is essential, essential to change behaviors, to recognize mistakes and to help improve.

So let us make good use of silence. Let us make it our palace of calm where we can meet again, where we can harmonize our emotions, where we can calm our mind and find in it the best answer, the most beautiful word for the moment most needed.