That Awkward Silence When You've Run Out of Things to Say to...Yourself.

I drove down Winnetka Street. I switched off the radio. There’s nothing good playing these days.

The silence in my car made me feel uncomfortable. I was alone with my own thoughts. And that scared me.

Since moving back to the US a month and half ago after living in East Asia for two years, silence is not something I have experienced. At first I didn’t hear it because I felt so overwhelmed and bombarded with culture shock all up in my face constantly. At some point I had to stop processing at the same rate I was experiencing in order to stay sane. I was going through a kind of shock and I switched to survival mode. One day at a time. One day at a time, I would tell myself. Then I didn’t experience silence because all I could hear was my own voice and the voices of everyone around me. People wanted answers and I wanted them too. I talked a lot because it was the only thing I knew how to do. I’m not sure what I talked about but talking about Asia gave me a moment’s relief from not knowing how to handle my current reality of not being in Asia.  Silence and processing got delayed again when my plans for this next year and this coming semester fell through. I was sent into a scramble trying to sort out my life, where I’d live, what I’d do, and how to pay for it all. Silence only exacerbated the loneliness I was feeling; the loneliness that we all experience when we’re walking through something that we alone simply must walk through. Then silence was postponed because I was afraid of it. I was so afraid I’d discover that I was falling apart. I was so emotionally, mentally, and spiritually exhausted that I just couldn’t handle sitting down and looking myself in the eye. I tried a few times to sit down and intentionally process the transition I’m in the middle of, but every time I’d try to let myself feel something I would instantly become intensely sleepy. Just the thought of thinking through things actually physically made my eyelids heavy and my head get fuzzy. And I really would fall asleep – a confused, escapist kind of sleep. I couldn’t figure out how to express or define how I was doing and where I was at. I couldn’t process, not because I didn’t want to but because I simply had no energy. And honestly, I was afraid. I was afraid to face the pain, struggle, and stress. I just wanted to be okay.

But there was nothing good on the radio. So I switched it off. And I suddenly found myself trapped in silence. My hand reached to turn the radio back on but I paused. No, I thought, I will not run. It was just me in my car with no voice to be distracted by, only the one inside to listen to. For a while I just drove in the quiet. Then all of a sudden, tears began to pour down my cheeks. And I let them. I realized I was crying not because I was falling apart, not because I was sad, not because I was stressed out, not because I was overwhelmed. I was crying simply because I just didn’t have any words (which as an extremely verbose person is a rarity). I wasn’t crying sad tears. I wasn’t crying happy tears. I was just crying because out of all the ways to express how I was doing and where I was at, tears seemed like the only thing that would hold and express it all. I just didn’t and still don’t have any words. No words to try to describe what I’ve seen, what I’ve felt, who I’ve been these past two years in Asia. No words to capture the lessons I’ve learned in transitioning to life back in America. No words. I’m sure there are words out there. I just don’t know how to say them right now. The joy I know deep down, the pain I’m breathing through, the experiences that are changing me, the lessons I’ve hashed out and am currently hashing out – it’s all I can do.

A few months ago I wrote about how I wasn’t coming back to the US. I said, “I shall do my best to cherish each and everyday, to remember that stress never saved the world, and to laugh and cry everytime I get the chance. What my future holds I do not know. I do not even know all of what my past holds, to be honest. But this I know for sure, I am grateful for yesterday, thankful for today, and welcoming of tomorrow because discovering the adventures of surrender is the kind of life I love living.”

And after driving in silence for a few minutes down the street in Los Angeles, all I can say is that I shall continue to do my best to be fully here where I am today, to laugh and cry every chance I get, to let myself be overwhelmed with gratitude more regularly, and to switch off the radio more often.