I stared out the window at the clouds today. Finch app said to admire the clouds or something.

I was so still and so quiet I had to ask myself, β€œam I sleeping?”

…”am I dead?”

I never just sit still like that. It was so bizarre. I felt like I stuck a bobby pin in the shaving machine socket.

When my thoughts said, β€œno not dead. Unless you have to fart in the afterlife too.” I laughed and stopped staring out the window.

Most mindfulness books describe meditation like: β€œI became aware of the vast stillness of consciousness.”

Meanwhile my internal experience was: β€œAm I sleeping?”
β€œAm I dead?”
β€œNo, because dead people probably do not need to fart.”

laughs and leaves

how quickly my brain interpreted stillness as a problem.

I was bored, or restless.
I was suspicious.

I became so quiet that my mind immediately started checking system diagnostics.

β€œThis is unusual.”

β€œHas something malfunctioned?”

β€œAre we offline?”

β€œIs this death?”

I suspect many people would not understand how genuinely strange stillness can feel when you are accustomed to a mind that is usually running seventeen tabs, three podcasts, two investigations, and a background process dedicated entirely to wondering whether a local heron has acquired a human disguise.

And the Bobby pin?
Most people assume peace feels warm and relaxing.

Sometimes it does not.
Sometimes it feels startling.

Like stepping into a room where a machine that has been humming for years suddenly stops.

The silence can feel louder than the noise.