THE SCREAM OF SILENCE
"God is the friend of silence. See how nature--trees, flowers, grass--grows in silence; see the stars, the moon, and the sun, how they move in silence." - Mother Teressa
We usually hear all types of sounds during our day-span. Most of those sounds are man-made(artificial) sounds. But we normally don't pay much attention to the sound that surrounds us, everywhere like; breathing, flickering of tube-light, voice of someone from the family, night crickets, people chattering, traffic noises etc. But when we're alone at late night, everything near us makes a sound & a lasting visual! Whatever we 'neglected' during other time seems to be the inevitable sound of silence during night-time. The second biggest reason of people being afraid of the night is the natural sound-effects that are unavoidable. Also the situation becomes so dramatic that even if you try to shush yourself, your brain will immediately search for a new sound & it will form an abstract bond-loop between you & the sound. This fact is nicely used by horror filmmakers & Oren Peli's recent wonder-hit, Paranormal Activity, is also such an example. At night, even the sound of your own breathing, footsteps, changing sides, crackling of bones etc might astonish you. This were the facts of natural sound that are most prominent during night. We become more conscious during night time that we focus on these sounds. The sounds remain the same but our mind is such an amazing machine that when it wishes to rest, nothing on earth can stop it but when things are other way around, it's indeed an 'experience. Here the irony is that generally we try to be in a silent/peaceful atmosphere & when we achieve that kind of atmosphere during night time, we seek an option similar to Ctrl+Z. So to avoid the 'silent-creeps', the best thing to do is sleep... That's right, night is a gift for the body to rest(not applicable during nail-biting situations) so why not use it! If finding sleep is too difficult then the only advice is to divert attention to one particular thing like thoughts, book, magazine etc. Mind is an amazing thing only till it drives us crazy.
"Nothing is so good for an ignorant man as silence; and if he was sensible of this he would not be ignorant." - Saadi
The other silence that screams is that of a person. When a person keeps mum, it becomes a rather painful & suffocating experience. But human nature is such a self-explanatory & self-contradicting that all the seasons of humanity are comprehensively covered by the layers of various emotions & types of expressions, with silence being one of them. We cannot tolerate a person who is just too-loud-to-handle & neither can we tolerate silence of the ones we care about. It is a frustrating situation, only if we don't understand the reason. If an Audio-less picture speaks a thousand words than how much can a full, living human being(mute) speak?! The person might become silent but his/her activities don't. They try to express themselves through the means of their work, along with their approach to that work. The best way to figure out is a stereotype, asking. Unless the person is confronted directly in an un-aggressive way, with warmth & care; the person is bound to throw out all the things that lead to the silence. But if approached in the opposite way, that might lead the person to depression. Silence is wrongfully taken as a sign of depression when it is a sign of sheer frustration. So a mature way is to approach as a child & it works wonders. We must also remember that a person becomes mute only when he/she has the confidence that we'll unravel the mystery surrounding it! So a lot depends on how the relation is, more importantly how well do those people know each other. A person's silence is the ultimate scream!
"Spiteful words can hurt your feelings but silence breaks your heart but we also need silence to be able to touch souls.” - Mother Teressa(modified)
