If there were one practice that I would invite you to explore above all other practices the one I would recommend is to develop a deepening relationship to the power of silence.

To encourage you to make a commitment to the foundational spiritual awakening practice, I will outline this invitation as follows:-

The Power of Silence

PART-I

• Who Should Practice the Power of Silence?
• Why Practicing Silence is Dangerous
• Why Silence is Golden
• Negative and Positive Silence

PART-II

• Key Benefits of the Power of Silence
• The Challenge of Silence
• Beginning the Practice

PART-III

• Practicing Silence Resources
• Related Practices (to be updated)

Overview

Click on the video below if you would like to review the full invitation that is on offer from this page included an overview of the benefits, resources and related practices.

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I think this practice is for most everyone especially those who focus on thought as the primary way of trying to solve problems. This is most of us.

The Power of Silence is the real way to think outside the box.

Most thinking is the re-structuring of the known. It is a practice of juggling information. It is not insight that leads to transformation. It is not NEW thought but regurgitating some form of the old.

Silence is the gateway to the unknown through which you have access to a different kind of KNOWING. This is where you are KNOWN through by universal intelligence. It is inspirationally creative.

This is true creativity. It is the real operation of The Law of Attraction. It is magical beyond belief but it is not phantasy or magical thinking. You enter the Stillness that Speaks through you by way of creativity, joy and enthusiasm.

Silence is the Sabbath of the soul. Therein we rest, and therein we hear everything—Marianne Williamson.

You move outside the box of the conditioned personal mind to invite understanding via the Universal Mind.

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Silence is dangerous because it gives you access to a power beyond belief. So you have religious hierarchical organizations teaching that silence allows for the work of the Devil to express through you.

Nothing could be further from the truth. This truth is known by all mystics of all times and traditions. Such a mystic was the German Christian mystic Meister Eckhart (1260-1398) who declared:-

The nearest thing to God is silence—Meister Eckhart

It is out of silence that the Divine speaks through you by way of enthusiasm (meaning “possessed by God”) inspiration (action from being in spirit) and enjoyment (being in joy of your Self).

The major reason that silence is dangerous, especially to established religious hierarchies, is because it gives you REAL authority. This is the real devil for most organized religion.

This is because when you tune into silence, you take your authority directly from the Divine. You no longer have any need of middlemen or women to tell you what you should or should not believe in.

You are on the journey to become a KNOWER.

Silence is dangerous because it sets you free to move from belief into KNOWING. You become a mystic. You are in love with access to the mystery.

You cannot control the mind of a mystic, but you can control the mind of a believer

Within each of us there is a silence—a silence as vast as the universe. We are afraid of it… and we long for it—Inviting Silence—How to Find Inner Stillness and Calm; Gunilla Norris.

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The word ‘golden’ is a metaphor for the gold of KNOWING the True Self. There is no greater treasure. It is from the experience of silence that you claim that treasure. From this golden experience you can declare:-

The Secret of Secrets is inside me again—A Land not Mine – Anna Akhmatova

This secret, golden treasure is the ability to FEEL your soul connection. You learn to FEEL the Force that destroys the darkness. In reality, there is no destruction. There is only illumination.

The Master Jesus says it this way:-

What shall it profit a man if he should gain the whole world and lose his soul—Mark 8-36?

The word ‘man’ as used in the above quotation is not gender specific. In fact, the whole approach to spiritual awakening is a feminine journey.

The soul is your energetic connection to Source.

A good analogy to use is to think of the soul as the sunbeam and the Source as the Sun. You are that sunbeam. You are here to shine that light into the world for the highest good of all.

This Sun is the Eternal Sun.

There is a song entitled The Long Time Sun written by Mike Heron of Scottish Hippie Rock Group The Incredible String Band. It is the song that ends Kundalini Yoga classes. Here, it is sung by Snatam Kaur.

The lyrics invite:-

May the Long Time Sun shine upon you. May all Love surround you and the pure light within you guide you on.

This suggests that the Long Time Sun is separate from you. This is not the case.

This has never been the case. This will never be the case. The Long Time Sun doesn’t shine upon you it shines through you as you. You become a radiant expression of Love’s forever becoming.

The Long Time Sun is the eternal and infinite Source of Love.

Access to it is through the gateway of silence. It is the gateway to the paradoxical experience of NO-THING that is EVERYTHING. Light in essence is NO-THING, but it is from Light that it makes all things manifest.

As the wonderful singer songwriter Leonard Cohen declares in his song, If it Be Your Will,  “In our rags of light all dressed to kill.”

And draw us near
And bind us tight
All your children here
In their rags of light

In our rags of light
All dressed to kill
And end this night
If it be your will
If it be your will

From If It Be Your Will
Leonard Cohen

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Most people feel uncomfortable with silence. We equate it with “nothing happening.” Mystics KNOW that silence is the movement of NO-THING out of which it creates everything. Silence allows for the creation of the forever NEW.

Negative Silence

The silence most people are familiar with is the silence that is the absence of noise—the absence of activity. This is what David Steindl writing in The Way of Silence—Engaging the Sacred in Everyday Life refers to as negative silence.

This is the only silence that most people are familiar with. For most people they equate it with the absence of noise. Notice how in most places you walk into that there is music or talk radio happening in the background.

For those who identify with the world of words, concepts and the overthinking personal mind silence is an experience of emptiness. There is nothing there. This brings up an unconscious reminder of death. Silence becomes akin to a deadly silence.

Why would anyone ever think there is value in entering such a nothing happening kind of state?

Positive Silence

I cannot overstate the power of silence. This is the silence of aloneness that leads to ALL-ONE-NESS. This differs greatly from the silence of loneliness.

Let me list you some positive benefits of the practice of the Power of Silence.

• Real University Education
• Alignment with Sacred Unity
• True Empowerment
• Health and Well-Being
• Finding True Faith

Lets explore these benefits in a little more detail.

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The original and authentic university education was and is, where you are educated by the Universe. It verses you in the experience of unity. This is not an intellectual understanding but does not exclude the intellect.

The Universe does not fill you up with information. It pours through you as an experience of KNOWING and transformation.

Silence gives you access to the experience of unity. It is education in the true meaning of that word. The word education means, “To bring out.” This is not the focus of today’s education that is on filling you up with information.

University education is where you allow the universe to express your soul into manifestation.

In the Gospel of Thomas, the Master Jesus says this:-

If you bring forth what is within you, what is within you will save you, if you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.—Gospel of Thomas—Nag Hammadi Library

More to the point, it is what you allow to be brought forth through you that will save you a great deal of unnecessary suffering.

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Silence is not separate. It does not divide. It is the gateway into sacred unity. Silence is the field where you lie down and connect. Rumi says it this way:-

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I’ll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about.― Rumi.

The singer songwriter Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol writing in the lyrics of his song Chasing Cars invites this unity when he sings:-

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Sacred unity through silence is not about learning to forget the world of time and space. It is learning how to feel the connection to the world beyond time and space.

These two worlds of time and the Timeless are not separate. They appear separate for the purposes of Creation. In living a commitment to silent interiority, you learn to transcend this dimension of time.

Silence in the positive sense takes you into the KNOWING of sacred unity.

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It seems strange to suggest that your real power arises from your connection to inner silence. This connection how you learn to Feel the Force (Star Wars)

It seems strange to suggest that your real power arises from your connection to inner silence. Through this connection you learn how to Feel the Force (Star Wars) .

This is not personal power. This is allowing transpersonal power to express through you. It’s not the creation of some powerful personal image. It is acknowledging that all true power is Divine power.

True empowerment is where you surrender your personal will to the Will of the Divine. This moves you from the focus on the will to personal power to the Will to Love. It is from the power to Love that your true sense of personal power arises. You recognize that this is a gift you allow to express through you and as you.

The power of silence puts you in touch with your true purpose, passion that leads to true prosperity.  You are a channel for how the Universe created you to express through you. Your real and authentic power is in your ability to get out of the way.

You become a Nowhere Man or woman who lives the power of NOW HERE. It aligns you with the power of Presence.

Sitting in his nowhere land
Making all his nowhere plans for nobody
Doesn’t have a point of view
Knows not where he’s going to
Isn’t he a bit like you and me?

As a real nowhere (NOW HERE) man or woman you aren’t like others. You don’t so much have a point of view so much as you have a way of seeing. You don’t know where you are going other than you are aligned with Universal intent. It is a magical mystery tour.

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We relate health to the experience of wholeness. Well-being is about feeling connected to the Source of Being.

The poet Denise Levertov reminds us of the need to drink from this well of being.

The Fountain

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water
to solace the dryness at our hearts.
I have seen

the fountain springing out of the rock wall
and you drinking there. And I too
before your eyes

found footholds and climbed
to drink the cool water.

The woman of that place, shading her eyes,
frowned as she watched-but not because
she grudged the water,

only because she was waiting
to see we drank our fill and were
refreshed.

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water.
The fountain is there among its scalloped
grey and green stones,

it is still there and always there
with its quiet song and strange power
to spring in us,

up and out through the rock.

by Denise Levertov.

To maintain health you will be assisted by your willingness to access the dimension of the wholistic.

This access is not through the voice in your head but through the deepening silence beyond words and concepts. Health in the fullest sense involves the energetic alignment of:-

• Spirit
• Soul
• Mind and
• Body

Most people are only ever consciously engaged with mind and body and even this is to a limited extent. The body is something that they are present to only when it gives concern for complaint.

People focus on the dynamic of the mental. They live mostly as an idea in their head. This is living from words and mental constructs. In this way we are each plugged into the collective Matrix of separation.

You do not access the source of healing, wholeness and well-being via the overthinking personal mind. This overthinking of the voice in the head is what the modern mystic Eckhart Tolle writing in The Power of Now refers to as the “normal insanity.”

Sanity is when you are guided from the Well of Being. You drink your fill. You drink of the living waters of the Spiritual. It refreshes your soul. You are alive and well.

All things are will. All things shall be well. All manner of things shall be well.—Julian of Norwich -Christian mystic (late 1342—after 1416)

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Silence invites you into the experience of true faith rather than the faith of the blind leading the blind.

Blind faith is a cerebral belief in teachings you have had no direct experience of. You can call this non-experiential dynamic belief but it isn’t faith. For example, how many KNOW the experience invited from Psalm 49 that says:-

Be still and KNOW that I AM God—Psalm 49

Most religious authority given in my youth when growing up in Northern Ireland and attending various Sunday schools and churches turned this statement into

Study the Bible and believe about God

The reason they do this is twofold:-

• The individuals have had no direct experience of KNOWING.
• You cannot teach the KNOWING experience

So let’s explore that further

No Experience of KNOWING

For those who are mystics, which is anyone who has had at least one encounter with God KNOWING is essential.

When I listen to most preachers, priests and clergy I can tell that most all of them have not had the experience of KNOWING I AM God.

The result is that all they offer is a teaching ABOUT an experience they have no experience off. It’s like someone who teaches the experience of childbirth who has never given birth to a child. Who would you prefer direction from?

Religious hierarchy would rather focus you on maintaining your belief rather than instruct you in how to live as a KNOWER. If you KNOW you have no need of belief. They are out of a job.

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You Can’t Teach KNOWING

You can teach the known in the sense that you can teach concepts, philosophy and theology. You can study the Bible, the Koran, the Torah and the Dhammapada and all that you might ever have is knowledge ABOUT God.

Any mystic will tell you that you cannot teach the experience that is KNOWING the Divine. Not that you do not want to teach this experience of direct KNOWING.

Both Mohammed and the Buddha each in their own way doubted their ability to teach the extra-ordinary revelation that they had been given. However, each KNEW what was on offer.

What can be taught is the practice of stillness and silence that allows you to be KNOWN THROUGH?

Silence is the beginning of real faith. It is the willingness to admit you do not KNOW the I AM experience. You can believe in the possibility to begin with but it is best if you connect with those who are mystics.

At least they will point you in the right direction to the Bright Field (R.S.Thomas) beyond right doing and wrongdoing. (Rumi)

I have met and witnessed to many ego maniacs teaching what they do not KNOW. They are the blind leading the blind into the pit of despond and into a deeper sense of attachment to belief. Jesus spoke of them this way.

But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in.—Matthew 23-13

It is still the same today. A mystic is someone who has “entered the Kingdom of Heaven” at least once. They at least KNOW what they are talking about. These are the people who walk that world as an expression of living faith.

This is faith in the KNOWING that they allow to be KNOWN through them. No belief only emptiness through which the Divine pours.  No belief to defend. Only the openness to the Presence of Love which they are guided from.

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In whatever way you practice the Art of Silence, the likelihood is that you will experience

• Impatience
• Disappointment and
• Doubt

Therefore, in the Gospel of Thomas, the Master Jesus says:

First you will be disturbed then you will be amazed—Gospel of St Thomas

The basis of the Western mind is achievement and getting results. It is the “I did it my way” approach to life. It is a “Pushing the river” kind of focus. It includes goal setting, and time management orientated ways of living. These have their place but tend to be unbalanced.

This is the focus on The Way of Doing Life rather than on The Art of Being (Eric Fromm) .

People are confused and unsure, they seek answers to guide them to joy, tranquillity, self-knowledge, salvation―but they also demand that it be easy to learn, that it requires little or no effort, that results be quickly obtained.― Erich Fromm, The Art of Being

Deep silence is a state of Being. It is a state whereby Creation pours through you. To access this state, you have to get out of the way and stop doing. This getting out of the way is shared in the wisdom instruction, “Those who would save their life shall lose it.”

An essential aspect of the practice of silence is to TRUST THE PROCESS. Not that you won’t have doubts. You will but you have to practice and witness the doubt and not give it energy. Conscious witnessing is a premier spiritual awakening practice.

Do the practice and allow it to unfold. Be as a gardener. Don’t go pushing the seed potential to grow in the way you want. Allow the seed potential in you to bloom as it is intended. Be allowing, which is a complimentary practice to that of the practice of the power of silence.

Sitting quietly, doing nothing, spring comes, and the grass grows, by itself.― Basho.

Let the Unfoldment Begin

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There are many ways to practice the Power of Silence. Whatever way you choose it is essential that you begin with the RIGHT ATTITUDE.

Begin with an attitude of exploration. You are an explorer of The Land not Mine wherein lies the treasure that is the Secret of Secrets. This treasure is inside you.

This Secret of Secrets is not a thing. It is a state of revelation. You don’t get it. It isn’t something you can add to yourself.

You will need infinite patience. This is a journey of exploration that lasts a lifetime and beyond. It takes you into the beyond of the Timeless. You will learn that you could never earn the magnificence that you will have revealed to you as you.

If you want instant results, if you are sure you already know what it is you are looking for (Belief) if you want to be in control of the process then you are going to struggle with the process.

The good news is that have all been there.

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All wisdom teachings recognize that the Power of Silence practice in one or more of the following ways:

• Meditation and/or
• Prayer and/or
• Contemplation

There are myriad ways of exploring the territory of silence through mediation, prayer and contemplation. This website will share with you many of these practices.

In the meantime, let me share with you the key practice that I use to engage with the power of silence.

Each morning I practice Yoga Nidra before I get out of bed. This is a practice I find works for me and one I feel able to commit to. I love this practice. I can say that it has greatly enhanced my life in terms of real prosperity.

I have written extensively regarding the practice of Yoga Nidra in terms of benefits and challenges.

Yoga Nidra is a spiritual embodiment practice. Two of the most popular posts on this website relate to this practice of empowered silence and spiritual embodiment.

These two blog posts are:

• Benefits of Yoga Nidra and Inner Body Awareness
• Benefits of Yoga Nidra and Inner Body Awareness

The Power of Silence is the Secret of Secrets that many are seeking. It is a paradoxical power in that everything is gifted to you out of your willingness to be available to NO-THING.

Can you imagine how popular an offer this would be in mainstream religion. The churches would be empty.  The Power of Silence allows you to claim your own authority in matters of spiritual guidance and awakening.

Let me now share with you other resources that complement your exploration of the Land Not Mine where the Secret of Secret is waiting revelation to you and as you.

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The resources I list below are reminders to the power of silence. Each of these resources has its own Toggle.

Each Toggle has behind it various resources such as videos, audios and more as appropriate to the resource.

I have structured the resource section in this way so that you can make your own choice about what most interests you.

Most all the resources I share hear are those I have bought and used. I share with you only the best that is available. Most all the material shared here are from people who are mystics—KNOWERS of God and who are, in my view,  authorized by the Divine to direct you in the premier wisdom teaching:

Be Still and KNOW

I will add to these resources as I find additional material that I think will be of value.

Related Pages of Interest.

Practices of Learning to Live a Spiritual Lifestyle.