Noise

So many headline topics. So much excitement, fear, dread, shock, and awe. We are pulled in one direction and then another. Our attention is begged continually by internet news feeds, summary newsletters, media outlets and certainly TV news. If they aren’t shouting a dire story at you, they are advertising one just 30 seconds ahead.

Noise. All of it noise. Does it symbolize anything? Activity, certainly; but meaning? Are we learning anything from the noise?

More noise. Advertising touting a product’s usefulness, or its humor, its piquancy, zest for living or whatnot. Noise. Constant noise.

The pandemic brought home peace. Solitude to ponder. Calm in which to read without interruption. Time to scan the noise for meaning, value and actual news.

Social distancing during the pandemic gave me this solace. Space came with it. Quiet. The on/off button to many devices were found. Blessed silence. No need even for music. Peace and quiet in which to  - discern. Ponder, think, sort and wonder. Logic kicked in and weighing thoughts became a ‘thing.’

Discernment is not easy. It takes work to fit puzzle pieces together until they create the whole image. From that we know the meaning of the whole, even then some doubt remains. Each piece is important as a part of the whole, but not in its aloneness. It means little if anything alone. Only when it joins its rightful place does it help meaning emerge.

Meanwhile the inbetween is where we exist. The noise is context, not meaning. The noise is background, not message. Do not confuse it with fact or truth or anything of value. It is what it is; noise.

The pandemic is/was horrid. People suffered. People died. Families mourned. Lives were disrupted and changed forever. But amid the horror is/was peace. Peace to think and find values that always were there but lost to the noise.

I treasure the peace gifted by the pandemic. I am using it to become whole again. I am discerning noise from meaning.

Politics is noise. Turn it off. Consider values and meanings of import. Seek the peace. Turn your back to noise.

Find the off button. Click it.

May 14, 2021