1.7 Sounds of Silence
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I created this blog to document my journey of confronting my genuine thoughts and beliefs. My primary objective is to leave a record of this journey for my grandchildren and future generations, hoping it may benefit them someday. I have made this information public, hoping it may help someone else. My goal is not to persuade anyone of anything but rather to learn how to express my thoughts aloud. This blog combines journaling, therapy, and prayer and sometimes contains abstract and personal content. I used John's account of his friend Jesus to inspire my thoughts about truth. If you like more background, there is an explanation in the introduction to the series - 1.0 When Faith Becomes Collateral Damage. All previous sections are available on my personal blog page.
In the previous segment, 1.6 Eyewitness ID, we explored how John the Baptizer begins the identification process as the eyewitness. We know very little of John's life, so in this segment, we will use our creativity to fill in some gaps and search for how he knew what he knew.
1:30 This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’ 31 I myself did not know him, but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.” 32 And John testified, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. 33 I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ 34 And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Chosen One.”
I have been privileged to watch four children grow up and now see grandchildren do the same. I love the early years when you can see the development happen week by week. They go from “everybody but Mama being a stranger” to recognizing daddy, brother, and sister, from babbling words to putting sentences together; watching their awareness expand before your eyes is an incredible experience. Similarly, John's growth from ignorance to knowledge in the verses above is remarkable and gives us much to contemplate.
““I myself did not know him,” ”
Twice within four verses, he stresses, “I myself did not know him,” which is strange, given that John and Jesus were cousins. Further, we have at least one record of their mothers visiting each other, so it seems unlikely they didn't stay on other occasions, and the two boys play together. They undoubtedly would have seen each other when the families visited Jerusalem for the holidays. So, we have a problem. What could he possibly mean? Why does he stress this point? John is explaining a change in his consciousness and an expansion of his realization – from seeing Jesus as his cousin to recognizing Jesus as the Chosen One.
In movies, when someone is taken hostage and forced to make a video, they often use unusual language to send a secret message. Although he is not a hostage, John uses this tactic twice to convey a hidden message about “how he believed” that most people will overlook. Maybe the author of the story, John, thinks we are not quite ready for it yet, but let's take a stab at it.
You can only understand the true meaning of his message by considering what we know about John, combined with his “knew him, but didn’t know him” wordplay in front of the camera. Watch as he hints at his ongoing process of believing by going from not knowing to knowing, from unaware to fully conscious. It is the “how to believe” that John, John, and Jesus used and modeled for us to follow.
Let's look deeply enough to fill in the process. In his solitary wilderness, John saw with his “mind’s eye” his role as “the voice crying out in the wilderness” and the baptizer. It became a reality by repeatedly focusing on this vision and completing daily action steps. His thoughts and ideas gave birth to actions that shaped his character and defined him as "the Baptist." In his silent excitement, John heard how to recognize the Chosen One, “He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain.” Then, as he baptized his cousin, Jesus, John’s active “mind’s eye” saw the Spirit descend upon him, and he just knew that he knew that he knew," This is the Chosen One.”
When Matthew tells the baptism story, he implies that everyone saw a dove and heard a voice, but it is not explicit.
Therefore, I am convinced this acknowledgment occurred within the consciousness of John and Jesus. Why? It gives us a model we can follow, and Jesus never said, "Wow, look at me," but, "Follow me.” To be a disciple always meant to "do as I do.”
That is where and how John first believed - in his consciousness - not a one-shot experience but an active, ongoing engagement. When I saw this process of awareness becoming a reality, I coined the term "Evidence-Based Faith.” Here’s my thinking: Puzzle pieces fall into place as I act based on my vision and engage in the process. As the assembled pieces begin to resemble the vision, my resolve is strengthened, and the process intensifies. This spiritual principle of creativity, endorsed by John and Jesus, helps us shape our future, find our purpose, and craft our lives.
This spiritual principle works regardless of our religious persuasion. Most self-help methods have modified it as we are told to select a goal, visualize it, affirm it, and achieve it.
“Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe it can achieve”
“If you can imagine it, you can achieve it. If you can dream it, you can become it.”
“You have to have a dream, whether big or small. Then plan well, focus, work hard, and be very determined to achieve your goals”
However, a crucial element is missing in the self-help method, which can expose us to the "arrival fallacy” and leave us feeling empty. According to "The New York Times," Harvard psychologist Tal Ben-Shahar defines the arrival fallacy as a widespread illusion that achieving a specific goal will lead to happiness. He mentions that the arrival fallacy has been experienced by celebrities and other highly successful people who end up experiencing mental illness and substance abuse even after achieving their dreams. Read more.
I can remember feeling depressed in specific jobs I've had in my career, only to look back on it and see it was the same job that had been an earlier goal of mine. What’s that they say, "Be careful what you wish for?”
In addition, the self-help process can lead to an obsession with completing daily to-dos, now called completion bias, or “the tendency of people to feel compelled to complete a task once they have started it.”
I noticed this when I started adding completed tasks to my to-do list to check them off.
Eventually, it drained the joy from performing each task because I only focused on finishing it.
Having a goal and the determination to achieve it is okay. It's a valuable, secular variation of the spiritual principle and the most effective way to accomplish short-term projects. However, it needs a extra component to avoid the above issues when crafting a meaningful life. The missing element in this generic approach to setting and achieving goals is a one-of-a-kind vision as unique as our genetic makeup.
One of my newly found beliefs is that "as there is a code written into my body (DNA), there is also a code written into my being." It was true for John and Jesus, and it's true for you and me.
If this is true, it begs the question, "Why are we not taught in school, church, or elsewhere that there is a unique path for our life and given lessons on exactly how to discover it?” There could be two reasons: (1) Teacher shortage. Someone who could teach this would be very rare because, according to Father Sylvan in Jacob Needleman's Lost Christianity, “Everything, absolutely everything about the Teaching must be experienced in ourselves and assimilated in our own being before we attempt to guide others." In John and Jesus’ time, it was taught through discipleship or apprenticeship. (2) Perhaps forces outside of us are competing with our internal life force, telling us what our vision should be. Others tell us what we should be when we grow up. Advertisers tell us what we should desire, from clothes to cars to lifestyles. Pharmaceutical companies tell us about medicines that relieve the symptoms that, all of a sudden, we think we have. Whew! Who has the time or energy to discover their unique vision?
One could also say that John and Jesus had it a bit easier than we did because of the abundance of the most vital resource for beginning this education – silence- in their world. I have often thought of my grandfather, a farmer who plowed his fields behind a mule in the 1930s and 40s. Just imagine the amount of "think time" he had. Today, it takes a real effort to find solitude. On his website, Joshua Becker writes, “I was reminded again how silence has become a difficult atmosphere in our society. It seems we have become uncomfortable with the very presence of silence in our lives. We speak of “awkward silences” in a room full of people. We fear that brief moment when we meet someone new and aren’t quite sure what to say.” Becker continues, “Meanwhile, silence quietly calls for our attention. Because only in extended periods of solitude, can we rediscover our hearts and the voice of timeless wisdom in our lives.”
He also addresses What's In It For Me (WIIFM). “The benefits of silence and solitude in a noisy world are significant and life-giving. In quiet moments of reflection:
We remove the expectation and influence of others.
We hear our heart speak clearly.
We reflect on our past and chart our future.
We find rest and refreshment.
We break the cycle of busyness in our lives.
We become better equipped to show patience and love to others.”
“To the mind that is still the whole universe surrenders.”
Once I realized the importance of solitude, I began incorporating moments of silence along with a cup of coffee into my morning routine. During these moments of silence, I had the idea to create this blog to (a) rediscover what I genuinely believe and (b) assist my future generations as they search for their one-of-a-kind vision, “the code within their being.” I firmly believe that if they start by taking time to be alone in silence each day, listening to their heart speak, everything else will fall into place. I hope you, too, will find a moment of solitude today and every day.
“Hello darkness, my old friend,
I've come to talk with you again,
Because a vision softly creeping,
Left its seeds while I was sleeping,
And the vision that was planted in my brain,
S
till remains…..
Within the sound of silence.”
Simon & Garfunkel
The ancient wisdom says, in my own words, “Trust in your inner voice with all your heart and lean not on your ability to figure things out from what you see externally; in all your ways acknowledge this voice in periods of silence, and your unique path will become clear and straight.”
In our next segment, we will continue to explore these verses about the inner life of John the Baptist and how they apply to us.
