Welcome to Christmas week when I’m going to let our MEA community give you the gifts of guest posts for the week starting with Tracey’s reflections on being silent. If this sounds interesting, you might check out Start with Silence: A New Year Silent Retreat in Baja Jan 5-10 that Teddi Dean is leading at MEA and I’ll be there at the start of the workshop. Based upon MEA’s first silent retreat, which got rave reviews, it may be a great way to start your year and enjoy a week on the beach in sunny Baja.
Not long ago, when I shared with friends and family that I was headed to a five-day silent retreat, they gave me the side-eye and wondered why I would do something like that.
Then again, they weren’t completely surprised that I would challenge myself that way after living an unconventional childhood in San Francisco in the 1960s and earning a degree from Berkeley.
Still, they know how chatty I can be.
Experiencing a silent retreat has been on my “want to do” list for a few years, but I discovered a more important “need to do” reason for me to try it.
In December 2024, I attended an MEA workshop in Santa Fe. My son’s caregiver sent me an entire page he had typed that morning. It began with, “I sit here on the couch with a revolving door of people speaking for me. You have to believe it never gets easier, but it is my life.”
Nicolas is 27 years old and minimally verbal due to Fragile X Syndrome and Autism. His primary form of communication is typing on his iPad. He has excellent receptive language, deep curiosity, and can clearly answer yes/no questions. Yet, he lives a challenging life because of the assumptions made about him and his inability to communicate in a typical way.
He continued, “I love my team, but I feel lonesome without words. I’m afraid people don’t know the real me. He shines and is full of wit. Nobody realizes it because I am cast to the background, bound to a life of silence. I would move mountains to be heard.”
On our last day in the MEA Circle, I read his full writing aloud to the group. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house. I realized how much empathy I could gain from living in my son’s silent world for five days, and the importance of making that effort.
With my silent retreat mission complete last month, here are a few reflections from spending five days in silence with Chip, Teddi, Saul, Lee, and Amie:
- Without technology or clocks, my relationship with and awareness of time changed. As discombobulating as it was not to look at a screen or a watch, there is freedom in not caring about time.
- Verbal communication is often overrated. The good stuff (or as Teddi calls it, “luscious”) is found in body language, eye gazes, and the ability to hear your inner voice.
- A cocktail or Xanax to reduce stress doesn’t hold a candle to a solitary walk in the awesome grandeur of nature.
- My monkey mind can be tamed.
- The gift of silence truly is just that—a gift. Dropping into silence gave me profound respect for how my minimally verbal son experiences life. He is wise beyond his years and deeply reflective—for good reason.
The week was difficult, I won’t lie. However, everyone, from the MEA facilitators to the hospitality staff, showed such grace and generosity as we navigated our way in silence and leaned into the beauty of the experience. I came home, hugged my son, and said, “I get it.”
-Tracey
Tracey Franks is an active MEA alumnus with five workshops under her belt. After a 35-year career on Wall Street, she discovered there’s more to life than a corporate costume and return on investment. She managed her risk well when she closed the curtain on the executive life and is now happily defining her next sense of purpose.