How to Get Comfortable with Silence

You notice the person you have tossed a line to appears to be having an ‘imaginal moment’ — that reflective quiet a person assumes as their world shifts. Inside you are rejoicing, and then … the silence continues.

Your self-talk steps in. Are they mad at me? Did I upset them? Do they not understand what I said? Was I unclear? As the silence makes you more restless, you might prepare to speak — to break your own uncomfortable silence.

I remember the times when I jumped in and disrupted the other person’s self-talk, especially when I interrupted that imaginal moment too soon. My disruption allowed them to dismiss their uncomfortable thoughts and go back to life the way it was. ‍

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What Would a Buddhist Do?

Thanks to the Macklin Method, I have since adopted some practices to avoid my self-defeating disruptions, and be more mindful of my speaking.

These practices come from the principles shared in the book How to Communicate like a Buddhist by Cynthia Kane. In Buddhism, there are four elements to mindful speech that can help you say what you mean and to remain present in your daily interactions:

• Listening to yourself
• Using silence as a part of speech
• Listening to others
• Speaking slowly, clearly, and concisely

With these elements in mind, I ask myself three questions as a strategic checklist for speaking:

• Is it necessary?  
• Is it truthful?
• Is it kind?

When I am assessing if speaking out loud is necessary, I ask the following:

• Does this need to be said?
• If it does, who needs to hear it?  Me? Or someone else?
• If it is me, I don’t need to speak it out loud. It isn’t necessary.

These checklists can help prevent me from viewing silence as a space to be filled with noise.  They also help me avoid filling the silence with a spoken story my listener might adopt instead of the one they are in the process of making up in their own head.

When I speak out loud words that I need to hear, I am no longer focused on the other person. I am focused on me and what I need.

If I need to have a conversation with myself, I don’t have to have it in the moment and can instead return to noticing the other person and their silence.  

How Long Do I Wait?

I use the standard of ‘give me a minute’ as a common request that most people accept. So, I periodically remain quiet for a minute. It helps me hold how long that is and isn’t. 

I can also notice how long it takes me to get anxious. This is my inner clock that indicates how long I am willing to be silent before feeling compelled to move on and, well, say something. I call this my ‘anxiety with silence’ space. It is the time period after which I risk being a nuisance by interrupting someone else’s inner contemplation with words to fill the void. 

Mine is actually around 10-15 seconds. What is yours? Can you hold the silence for a minute?

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