Silence is the highest form of music ... Music of the infinity, referred to as the music of the spheres, is often heard in deep solitude or reflected in natural sounds -- the wind, the ocean, the melody of birds. The single note of a temple gong is far more powerful than an orchestra of one hundred instruments. The clear sound it produces reverberates deep within our mind and body, conveying a sense of infinite peace and bringing us close to the melodious silence of infinity.
In the Sahara one day, I climbed over a dune to descend into a deep bowl of sand. Sitting at the bottom I encountered for the first time absolute silence, stillness that is indivisible. For there are two silences: a silence can be no more than the absence of noise, it can be inert; or, at the other end of the scale, there is a nothingness that is infinitely alive, and every cell of the body can be penetrated and vivified by this second silence's activity.