The Sound of Now

Musicians spend a lot of time in The Now.

We drop in to Now-time every time we bring our heads and our hands together, even when we are performing. Once in a while, we reach an altered state and the lights, the mics, the direct boxes and amps and audience and everything fades into mist, becomes utterly transparent, and we are nothing but sound organized into music – our truest divine state.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll keep saying it until I transcend the physical and exist as sound permanently:

Sound is the Stuff that holds the Universe together.

But what is the holiest, most transcendent sound of all? The spaces between the sounds that allow us to remember who we are. The silence between breaths. The stillness between heart-beats.

That sound is hard to find. We live in a world where silence is nearly impossible. Even in our homes there is no real silence. There is the hum of the refrigerator (or in some cases the rattling cough), the whirring of the fan that heats or cools us, the sound of neighbors, trains, traffic, airplanes, car alarms, idiots blasting horrid sounds out of bad car radios, attention-demanding jerks on motorcycles tuned to oppress. “Yes, that’s quite a conversation stopper you’ve got there; the peace and tranquility of this moment has been obliterated. Gosh.”

I was deep in meditation a few weeks back, talking with a guide who was teaching me about “seeing” and “hearing” through my pineal gland, which is really a processing center for sight and hearing, among many other things. Third Eye, Third Ear, Second Nose . . . It’s the hardest workin’ gland in show biz. I asked, “So, what you’re telling me is, Nature speaks through these ordinary sounds like cicadas and birds and owls and dogs and the wind in the trees, and if we shut off the ordinary auditory processing and shift everything over to the pineal, then we can begin to understand it more like a language?”

“Right,” my guide affirmed.

“So . . . right now, all I can hear is the neighbor’s stupid air conditioning unit that is in desperate need of repair.”

“Well, that’s the natural habitat humans have made for themselves now, isn’t it? Air conditioning units are part of the physical reality you have made, and so they are imbued with the sacred spirit of the One. Listen.”

I listened.

“What’s it saying to you?”

I had to think about it. “Duuuuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhh . . .”

I could feel my guide shrugging. “Okay, I didn’t say they were wise . . .”

“I really don’t need more stupid,” I sighed. “So . . . how do I find the wisdom?”

“Listen under the sound. Go around it, behind it. What do you hear?”

It took some time, but eventually I heard crickets, wind rustling leaves, night birds, a dog barking in the distance, and of course the never-ending hum of the interstate (which is just as stupid as the air conditioning unit).

And for a few moments, the bloody racket from next door was gone. I was utterly unconscious of everything else around me, focused completely on listening to the world around and beyond the influence of this old and decrepit piece of technology. My mind was still, my breathing slow, my emotions calm. I was an ocean of serenity.

When the a/c unit kicked off, it was kind of shocking. Suddenly everything else got really loud. I had to laugh. I had found transcendence within, around and beneath the cacophony of civilization. It was exhilarating, in a strange way. My guide hit it on the head: this is our natural habitat now. This is the world we have created, but we can use the cacophony to go deeper into the silence, deeper into the true self that is made of sound.

I’ve called myself a Lightworker for years, but now . . . I’m calling myself a Soundworker.

May you find and receive the blessings of true, sacred Silence.

Reading is very quiet. You can’t hear your eyes move at all. Subscribe and I’ll be super quiet every Tuesday so you can read this stuff undisturbed.