Day 41 - the end and beginning

Yesterday I finished by 40 days of silence.  When I took my ear plugs out and began my day, there were several things that were apparent.  First , I heard the creaking of the floor under my feet, the brush of my clothes as I slipped them on, the hum of the water out of the faucet, wind outside blowing through the trees, my feet scrunching through the leaves, the cars swooshing by my front door, the handle of my car door as I opened it up, the creak of the cart walking into walMart.  I could hear people's little side conversations from 30 feet away.   My car roared!  I thought something was wrong with it.  There were a hundred little things I noticed that I'd left forgotten over the last 40 days.  It was nice.  Nice being able to soak it all in.  These were just the little things.  What would absolute silence have been like?

I taught, talked, listened and functioned as I normally do, although a little hampered.
Tomorrow, things are about to change radically.

Tomorrow no speaking.

James 1:19

 ¹⁹ My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry,

I want to explore being slow to speak in a whole new way.  I would like to drastically cut down on my chit chat.  If any of you have ever read Chapman's Love languages books you know about the five different ways we process/receive love.  I am a words person.  If someone tells me they love me, that's good enough for me.  Quality time, acts of service, affection, and gifts are all secondary.  Since I am a words person, I have a tendency to put more value in words as I interact with others.  This probably feeds my constant disclaimers, explanations, and equivocations.  To have these taken away, would severely dampen the way I express myself and interact with others.  There is nothing wrong with this per se, except all this is usually centered around me, not God.  This is about my focus.

Therefore this is what I am going to do.  For the next forty days, I am not going to speak to/with anyone unless it is a prayer (to God), or a word (about God).  No more small talk.   We will see how it goes.  Already some of the ladies and kids at church are scheming how to break me.  I've told them exclamations don't count so if they want to be successful they have to be sly, not sadistic.  lol.  I guess today I will get some cards made up, explaining my situation, or maybe I will just pretend to be dumb.  Maybe the slowed down process of writing things out for people will cure me of foot in mouth disease.  We will see.  It should be a fun adventure.

Oh, and I'm still trying to figure out where I stand on baby talk.