There is something we didn’t even notice before, and then, slowly and quietly, it disappeared from our lives.

 

Silence.

 

There used to be pauses. Moments when nothing happened. You sat on a bus, looked out the window, and thought. Or you didn’t think, you just were. There was nothing to pick up, nothing to scroll, nowhere to escape.

 

You were with yourself.

 

And sometimes it was boring, sometimes it was uncomfortable. It pressed on you, it unsettled you. But something was happening underneath. Thoughts were forming, feelings were settling, things were falling into place. Dreams were taking shape, love was deepening, ideas were being born, futures were beginning to form.

 

Today, this almost no longer exists.

 

If there is a moment of silence, something immediately fills it. The phone comes out, we check what happened, who wrote what, who posted what, who is online. Not because we truly care, but because we can’t tolerate the emptiness.

 

As if silence had somehow become dangerous.

 

But it hasn’t. It has just become unfamiliar. In the constant static that flows into our heads all day, silence feels like a warning, like a signal that we’ve lost connection to what has become our natural environment, the network.

 

And somewhere along the way, without even noticing, we lost something.

 

The ability to be with ourselves.

 

Because silence is not simply the absence of something. It is not just the lack of sound. Silence is a space. A place. It gives room for something inside you to be born.

 

But to experience that, you have to stay in it.

 

And that is becoming harder and harder.

 

Because noise is easier. You don’t have to do anything with yourself in it. You don’t have to face anything. It just happens, and carries you along. Silence doesn’t carry you. In silence, you have to stay.

 

And maybe that’s why we avoid it.

 

Because when there is finally silence, there are no excuses left. There is nothing else to look at, nothing else to listen to, nothing else to occupy yourself with.

 

You are left with yourself, and that is not always comfortable.

 

Maybe that’s why everything has become louder. Not because we need it, but because we are afraid of what speaks inside us when it’s quiet.

 

And maybe the real question is not why silence has disappeared.

 

But when was the last time we were able to remain in it.