She said, "After you gave a talk on right speech, I've been practicing it." "Yes, you've done that well, I've noticed. Now, it's time to practice no speech. That, too, is right speech." "What do you mean?" she asked. "No speech as right speech is more than just not talking; it's being present wholly, all senses open and aware. If another is speaking, it means listening with your whole being. Not talking is talking, too."
*Brian K. Wilcox. "Meetings with an Anonymous Sage."
Meditation is training in speaking that is not speaking, and this is a reason we can find meditation so challenging. And we may experience something we see as amazing in meditation, and we feel anxious to get out so we can share it with someone or write it down. Through the Silence, we learn to be silent.
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The Sufi Kabir Helminski, in his The Knowing Heart, quotes the Sufi Rumi...
Whatever I have said about love, when love comes, I am ashamed to speak.
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When I was a boy, an image was of cleaning out the mouth. Some parents took the cleaning beyond metaphor and used soap to wash out a child's mouth for speaking what was referred to as vulgar words, cussing, or cursing. Mispeaking now, as then, is usually associated with saying something that ought not to be spoken. But misspeaking can entail speaking at all.
We cannot step outside of misspeaking. We cannot, for we can never speak what anything is. How much more do we misspeak when speaking of qualities like love, joy, peace, compassion, God, etc.?
Today, I sit here and look out the windows at the tree limbs covered with ice. I see a winter wonderland on a sunny day after a storm. The beauty is stunning, but I cannot speak it. I can enjoy it. I can welcome it to show itself and come near to me. Then, the scenery and I enter into an intimacy. I am not just seeing it. I am being joined with it. I came sitting with it.
Rumi's words on love fit this experience. Love is thrown around, often casually, even flippantly, and like we know what we are talking about. Do we?
We may, but we do not. That is, love cannot fit in any head. We can know love and any quality through meeting. When we step outside the encounter to speak of love, we misspeak. I do not mean erasing "love" from our talk, but it means utilizing the word and other words of qualities more wisely and respectfully, even reverentially. When I speak a quality well, the other has a better chance of experiencing it in a way similar to my experience of it. My words can be a conduit of the manifestation passing from my encounter to the person in the present, for the quality is timeless. The Word becomes through words.
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Misspeaking can mean not speaking at all. We can learn to be quiet—not to speak. We observe how we think we need to tell others about the encounter... that is, what we think about it. Refraining from this pulling experience into language, we learn to relax in the sense of the quality.
Moving to Maine from Florida, up over a thousand miles, I felt a sacred pilgrimage. A friend and I talked on the phone early on the trip, and I shared some of what was happening. She was enthused for me. On another day, I picked up the phone to share more and sensed an inner guidance not to, to treasure what was happening. I put the phone down.
Part of the Path is learning the wisdom of not speaking. In understanding this, we can speak wiser and more timely. We grow comfortable holding certain experiences close, honoring them quietly rather than broadcasting them. By holding them close, we can sink deeper into the quality, inviting it to manifest more subtly. We allow it to unfold itself not only to us but through us. Talking about it can dilute the encounter, diminishing our embodiment of it.
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Last, some experiences are not meant for others to know about. Let us be careful what we share about experience of the Sacred. Sometimes, the experience is open to sharing, and sometimes, not. We may experience something to share with one or a few, or many, or no one. We may wisely not share now but later or never. Please remember that some things you experience may be too precious to enter and leave your mouth.
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*(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2024. Permission is given to use photographs and writings with credit given to the copyright owner.
*Brian's book is An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love. The book is a collection of poems Brian wrote based on wisdom traditions, predominantly Christian, Buddhist, and Sufi, with extensive notes on the poetry's teachings and imagery.
