My dad filled my youth with little bits of counsel that somehow stuck with me long after I’d expect them to have faded. Once, in my early teens, I became entranced by a world of astonishing musical genius (yes, in 1990 I truly was the first person to discover Paul, John, George and Ringo– or at least the first to recognize the limitless depth of their heavenly gift), and began to spend a great deal of time hidden behind headphones or deafened by a car stereo.
My dad noticed the development, and tolerated it at a vaguely displeased distance. A good friend was bemused when I mentioned the reaction of my parents, and he submitted that they ought to be grateful I wasn’t listening to Metallica. True, I thought, there are worse things than the Beatles and Simon & Garfunkel. Besides, this music is really theirs to be ashamed of, not mine.
At intervals, my mom would take a moment to explain that she detected an unhealthy cynicism in Paul Simon’s lyrics, or a double entendre in a McCartney tune. But I learned that my dad’s objection was more obscure. I remember a moment alone with him in his study. “Ryan,” he said, “Sometimes we need quiet. Sometimes the Spirit needs quiet.” I was the kid that always knew the exact meaning of all of Dad’s sometimes oblique admonitions, and I knew exactly what he meant. I’ve never put on headphones since then without a tiny twinge of guilt over what I might end up missing.
Fifteen years later, I see that the role of secular music in my life has waxed and waned. Currently, it waxes. I’m the proud owner of a little machine that presently contains about 3500 songs, which my Itunes informs me can envelope my brain for about 9.6 days (in my defense, about three hours of that hypothetical week and a half would be religious listening). In order to exploit my investment, I seek every opportunity to listen to my music. And to add new music, and to find more time to listen to my new music. But the rattle of the earbuds is occasionally drowned out by the sounds of that distant conversation, urging me to seek out silence.
And I have to say, I’m disappointed. I always thought that by now I would have ascended to a vantage point that allowed easy sorting between the important and the trivial. In my naivete, I assumed that the world would run out of attractions for me once I was an adult. In truth, there are myriad more distractions than ever before. Just as in my youth, I’m avoiding the pernicious and ugly inputs. But I’m still plugging in to a variety of voices, and few of them come from God.
For some reason, in my recent trips to the temple, I’ve found one lesson particularly ripe. It’s the theme that I am here to cling to my spouse, and with her, find truth in opposition to the wisdom of the world. That idea of viewing worldly input with great suspicion, resonates with me, I’m not sure why. Participating in the temple with a focus on the tension between my eternal union and the incessant distraction of the world, I see clearly what is hard to see elsewhere– that our struggle here is not always about good and evil, but sometimes about focus and distraction.
And it’s that more subtle battle that we often concede, while wondering why the larger battle of good and evil can be so difficult. And so today, on an afternoon of rare quiet, alone in the house with Handel just audible from the kitchen, I’m wondering what the Spirit needs. What I need. And I’m realizing that my dad was right. Quiet is a gift, and one too rare in our lives.