Q is for . . . Quietude



Image Courtesy: Raj Manchekar

My cutie pies,

Q is for the Question. El Niño is much too young right now, but you, La Niña, have so many of them. "Mamma, where was I when you got married to Dadda?", "Mamma, can I eat one more piece of cake?", "Mamma, where do crows sleep?" I can barely cope with the onslaught of the questions that rain down on me.

Some of your questions make me smile; others provoke me to think. I welcome them all. Not something I can say of the other questions that rear their ugly heads in spite of my attempts to ignore them. Questions of how to fit needs into budgets, uncertainties about what tomorrow will bring, and doubts about how things will turn out.

When I feel myself crushed down under the weight of these questions, I think of another Q, Quietude, which alone has the power to take the sting out of the unending questions. And I realise that there is a place in the depths of my heart into which I can retreat, where none of these questions can hurt me.

It is not easy to enter this place. You need to first turn down all the clamour of life. Switch off the TV, the radio, the cellphone. Tune off the noises on the street, the blaring car horns, the whistle of the pressure cooker, the whir of a neighbour's vacuum cleaner.


It is not easy to make your way to this inner sanctuary. We become so accustomed to the noises around us. Even when the noises around cease, we cannot hush the noises inside our heads. What's worse, worry has us in a vice-like grip.


Sometimes it helps to remove oneself physically from the noisy marketplace that is the world and go somewhere quiet, like a library, or a place of worship or a place where you can be assured of solitude and the company of nature. 

If that's not possible, wake up before anyone else in the house does. Sit still and allow yourself to be washed by a wave of peace that is the preserve of the early day before the busyness of life takes over. Right there in your own inner sanctuary. In the midst of the hullabaloo of life.


There you will find your true self. That essence that otherwise gets drowned under mounds of laundry and bills and the clutter and cacophony of everyday life.

Take time to be still. Resist the urge to make haste always. Water, left still, becomes clear. So it is with our minds.

In time you will find it easier to withdraw into yourself and imagine what the eye of a tornado must feel like. Then you will know that quietude can strengthen you deeply and that your soul sometimes needs to wind down.

If  you remember what we learned in H is for Health, then you know that the body will stand by you if you treat it well. But the body isn’t all we’ve got.

We are not bodies that have a soul. I believe that we are souls that have a temporary body. What we are here is but a blip in the context of forever.

The soul needs its own brand of food, including music, the arts or a good book. But Quietude is its favourite. 

I wish that you may never be too jaded to be healed by a carpet of grass, the sunrise and the great waves lapping against the shore. I wish that you may never forget to give your being the nourishment that only quietude can provide.

I hope someday you will take this lesson to heart. But not just yet. Right now your mamma needs your innocence and your incessant questions.

Your school will be teaching you the 3 Rs, reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic, but if you meet me here tomorrow, I'll tell you about another R that is no less important.

Hasta la vista, babies.