No. 18 — The Hum

There is just so much noise. A cacophony of voices screaming jarringly. Out of tune, out of harmony. Desperately screeching, one louder than the other.

The moment I open my phone it starts screaming. “Don’t forget the dentist appointment.” “Answer the text immediately.” “Work on that task now.” Appointments, messages, tasks — everything yelling at me directly, everything urgent, everything immediate.

And as I open the social media apps, the stories get even louder. People yelling at one another, or at no one in particular — always high pitched, many filled with the deep resounding undertone of righteousness. Caricatures of themselves, out of their minds, disconnected from their hearts, screaming their truth desperately into the ether. One absurd statement after the other, like a wall of sound closing in.

The sound of the world is a song no more. It is a scream.

The ancient, off-key song of separation. The deep, rhythmic bang of “I know better”, accompanied by the baseline of “I am right therefore you are wrong”, supported by a higher pitched shriek of: “shut up and accept my truth as yours.”

A loud, disharmonised choir of righteousness. A desperate cry. Real pain. Profound lack of direction.

Everyone eager to share their version of reality. So many stories, so many melodies that don’t align. And in the loneliness of our own song, we turn up the volume. As if sheer loudness could do what harmony cannot — spread our melody into other lives, other realities, until everyone sings along. Until finally there is peace, because everyone agrees on our truth.

A misguided hope.

We are each singing our own song. Interpreting, meaning-making, weaving the world into the melody that makes sense to us. When our songs overlap, we feel seen. We gather, we amplify, we build a choir. Someone will always scream along.

And yet — the noise does not only live out there. It lives inside of us as well. The internalised voices that have taken up residence without invitation. The inner critic, the inner judge, the inner commentator who never quite switches off. The world’s choir has long since moved inside — and often, we cannot tell anymore where the outside scream ends and our own begins.

In that chaotic song, there is no direction, no sanity.

At some point, I just want everyone to shut up. The news. The feeds. The opinions. And my own mind, with its own relentless stories. So I stop. I press pause. I wait.

And then they do.

All sounds halt — as if someone has pressed pause in the middle of the song. And in that sudden stillness, I notice it. Another melody, rising from beneath.

It was always there. Underneath the cacophony of fear, the universal and unifying sound of love — the hum of the universe, quiet and constant. In every battle of opinions, peace was already present. In every screaming voice, a heart longing to be heard. The sound of universal connection, never gone — only drowned out.

Because my radio had been tuned to the wrong frequency. Locked into separation, into noise, into the endless loop of right and wrong — I could not receive the one melody that elevates us from our pain. The one that sings of one family of being, one common heart, beating inside the infinite.

In this melody there is no disharmony, no disconnection. It is all-pervading, all-encompassing, all-loving.

Just like the moment when the music suddenly stops — the silence is breathtaking. A deep relief. A breath finally taken.

In its presence, all is well.

• Where in your life is the noise loudest — outside, or within?
• When did you last press pause long enough to hear something beneath it?
• What would it mean to tune your life to a different frequency?