How to Listen to Silence

Even bears sometimes hug the corner going downhill.  If you poke around Big Bend enough you will see a few signs for bear here and there.   I have been here many times but never ever seen one or even anyone who had seen one.  Now, I'm a believer.   This guy was just going for a walk in the middle of the afternoon and using the road for a little relaxation.   Gotta love it.

It's amazing to be in a place that you love and not be a complete tourist.  By that I mean have enough time to actually explore without having to be some place.  Tourists have an agenda.  See this and see that and then we go here and stay there..  All that.  Being lost in between tourist and local is a strange new world.  I am now a "toucol".  Half tourist  and half local.

One of my new favorite places is Sotol View.  A little point that rises above the Maxwell road on the way to Castellon.  Simply breathtaking.  It's a shame that the photo doesn't do it justice.  I spend hours  there in my new chair.... 12.99 in Alpine.   The silence was unforgettable.  Not a human sound for hours.  Just the wind in the brushes and sounds of flying creatures humming around.

How to listen to Silence

1. Find a place that is silent.  Not quiet but silent.  Lot's of places in our world are quiet but few are silent.

2. Get a comfortable chair.  Spend more than 12.99

3. Face the sun.  Not for the sunset but for the warmth.  Looking into the sun will make you close your eyes and stop looking around at things.  Feel the warmth on your skin and breath.

4. Open your ears.  Relax all those things around your ears.  I know it seems weird but try it.  You will know when it happens.

5. Then here is the big one....move yourself outside yourself.  Stop thinking and listening to yourself and move your awareness just 10 feet from your body.  practice makes perfect.

6.  Find those sounds that have been lost from you.  The sound of grass rustling, leaves rubbing together, branches and bugs....  then listen to the sound of wind as it moves over your ears, that little roar that comes when you hold your head just right and how silent it is when you move it the other way.  Now it's time to move yourself farther out....until the reach the silence itself.   I think there are few things like it...