Matt Calderon – A BloG

Through our reading I contemplate two disciplines: silence and solitude. The first one is a condition where noise isn’t allowed in. No outside sound and no inside sound. What does that look like? In the book Comer expresses Saint Augustine’s quote:

entering silence is “entering into joy.” (Comer, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, 2019)

We have to enter. That means we exit out of hurry. Out of my phone. Off of distraction. Into a remote place. Just like Jesus.

Internally that looks like a centering prayer or a meditation and remembrance of everything the Lord has done for me.

The second discipline for me is much harder. Solitude. If silence is the framework for Gods presence then solitude is the medium in which we get there. Comer explains it like this:

straightforward. It’s when you’re alone, with God and with your own soul. (Comer, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, 2019)

It’s how I come away with the Father to meet one on one. It requires me to present myself completely alone. It’s a spatial consecration.

Sasha DiGiulian is an American professional rock climber, a 3 time US National Champion, and a Female Overall world champion. She was the first female to ever summit El Capitan known as the Platinum Wall. It is 2.5 times the height of the Empire State Building.

And yet she was stuck 2600 feet in the air for 9~10 days because of weather. She had to stay in a storm to ascend the mountain. To be the first. And she did it. She’s a true enthusiast and champion. This same woman who did this incredible crazy feat also gave advice that:

adventure is not always a far away summit. She said that sometimes it’s a quiet morning walk, a deep conversation, or building something from scratch that you believe in. Finally she says that adventure is a mindset and joy lives in the everyday moments between the sends.

Silence and Solitude is a mindset as much as it is a discipline. Like Sasha being stuck on the side of the mountain, her entire being was fully invested in ascending it. She had mastered the discipline of adventure.

It’s time to start mastering the discipline of silence and solitude. Then when I go to practice it and the storm comes and I get stuck no matter the circumstances I too will prevail because I will have come to meet with the father who knows me, who cares for me, who loves me, who made me, who wants to spend eternity with me.