Dear readers,

Silence is not only an absence of sound or thought. This issue explores silence in its many depths: the silence we try to create, the silence that comes unbidden, and the silence that lies beyond both.

In “Silence,” Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee reflects on 50 years of companionship with silence as an inner state, exploring its emptiness, space, and hidden presence. 

In “The Heart of Silence,” Daaji recounts a story from Chariji’s early days with Babuji: expecting words of instruction, Chariji heard only the soft bubbling of a hookah, and later came to understand Babuji’s silence as the teaching itself. Daaji goes on to distinguish two inner silences. One, we impose by force of will, by holding the mind still. The other arrives uninvited, as a gift. 

And in a letter from August 1976, reprinted in this issue, Babuji describes inner silence as the seat on which Silence stands.

We welcome your reflections, experiences, and other submissions. Please visit https://heartfulness.org/magazine/contribute.

Happy reading,
The editors