24. Silence and Solitude are essential for me to grow in self-awareness.

(Before looking at the questions below, take a few minutes to think about this statement. Invite Jesus to speak to you about what He would like you to notice.)

HAVE YOU EXPERIENCED TIMES OF BEING COMPLETELY ALONE? HOW WERE THEY FOR YOU?

CAN YOU IMAGINE BENEFITS OF PRACTICING SILENCE AND SOLITUDE?

WHAT KEEPS YOU FROM EXPERIENCING SILENCE AND SOLITUDE?

Self-awareness and reflective capacity seem to be getting harder and harder to acquire in our post-modern culture. But nearly two thousand years ago, men and women faced similar challenges to ours and some responded with what might seem to be extreme measures. They left their comforts and culture and moved out to the desert to live mostly alone, in silence and solitude. Though they may appear to us as misguided radicals, what they teach us about silence and solitude is invaluable.

In his book, The Way of the Heart Henri Nouwen reflects on the effectiveness of silence and solitude in the process of transformation for these desert saints. He says, “Solitude is the furnace of transformation. Without solitude we remain victims of our society and continue to be entangled in the illusions of the false self: (Nouwen, Henri J. M. The Way of the Heart. HarperOne. Kindle Edition.) As long as we surround ourselves with people and possessions, we can avoid the “furnace of transformation.” But when we enter solitary places, with no people, devices, or conveniences, we enter this furnace.

Some may imagine solitude as a respite and escape from a busy life, but Nouwen says that “solitude is not a private therapeutic place. Rather, it is the place of conversion, the place where the old self dies and the new self is born, the place where the emergence of the new man and the new woman occurs.” He goes on to say that solitude is thus the place of purification and transformation, the place of the great struggle and the great encounter. Solitude is not simply a means to an end. Solitude is its own end.

What the desert fathers and mothers knew, and what we must re-learn, is that solitude and silence are indispensable for our growth in self-awareness, reflective capacity, and relationship with God. Although there are many disciplines and practices that may help us in our journey to self-awareness, without silence and solitude we will never reach our destination. This may seem extreme, but I believe that it is true. It may not be popular in our culture, and there may be few who will take the challenge to practice it, but

the lesson of past journeyers is that without silence and solitude, we will fail to become our true self, the self that God created us to be, the self that experiences abundance and the self that overflows this abundance into the lives of others. Nouwen went on to say, “What becomes visible here is that solitude molds self-righteous people into gentle, caring, forgiving persons who are so deeply convinced of their own great sinfulness and so fully aware of God’s even greater mercy that their life itself becomes ministry.”

Self-awareness is essential for wholeness. Reflective capacity is necessary for us to become our true self, to enjoy a relationship with Jesus and others, and to experience the abundance this brings. But without solitude and silence we will never experience this.