| Surround Sound |
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| Tuesday, 15 July 2008 | |
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Tamra Palmer suggests turning down the volume on our noisy lives and enjoying a bit of peace and quiet. Phew! Out of the incredibly noisy super-duper-centre and into the car park. Just point the old remote-control device at the car - ker-chank - and open it up - beep-beep signifies that the door's open. Bing-bing - more high-pitched beeping suggests that the door isn't quite closed. Fine. Slam! Mmm, now it's the mobile - diddle-it-dit-dit-dit - and a rude driver - honk! - okay, I'm going! Could this be your slightly raucous trip home? Ah, home! Yep, finally back inside the old sanctuary. Diddle-it-dit-dit-dit - there's the mobile again. Just unplug the blaring music. Ring-ring - now it's the landline as well. Bipp-bipp - incoming email. Whiiiiiii - and now it's the kettle! Have you ever considered how noisy our lives have become? We now have smart cars, smart appliances and smart everything else, designed to remind us in no uncertain blaring terms that we haven't turned off, unplugged, closed properly, switched on or tuned in every possible electrical or battery-operated alternative. And the weird thing is, we're not fighting back - it seems we're giving in. In fact, not only are we not turning off the noise, we're encouraging it. We're choosing noisy mobile ring tones - and lots of them. We're carrying phones and palm pilots around with us - even at the doctor's, and yep, sometimes into the loo. We're plugging in our earphones so that every waking moment has some sort of associated noise. We're leaning on our car horns at intersections while we're yakking on our hands-free phone and listening to the radio. And then to escape, we're heading home to turn on the CD player, radio or answering machine, while our bread-maker beeps and our gas heater hums and our mobiles and landlines lie in wait, permanently on, permanently ready to participate in the noise-fest. And not only that, but many of us have allowed our children computer games that emit horrible noises that we battle endlessly to turn down. What's going on? Where's that alluring sound of silence? Pretty much drowned out under the weight of all this ambient noise... Is it any wonder that people race off in their sat-navved, CD-strewn cars to yoga and pilates? Bugger the exercise - it's probably to get a bit of peace and quiet. Do you think Leonardo da Vinci had this much noise around when he was formulating his helicopter designs? Or while he was painting Mona Lisa? Did Michelangelo battle a constantly ringing mobile while he chipped away at David? Did Marie Curie have to turn down her raging walk-person so she could discover how to isolate polonium and radium? Could this amount of interaction, stimulation and decibelisation actually be good for us? Can geniuses work under these conditions? Could someone just turn the noise down a little so we can think about this? If not for ourselves, then one compelling reason to check out this noise stuff is for our children. There's been a lot of talk about kids becoming obese from sitting on their growing bottoms watching TV and playing video games. ‘Where are those halcyon days of climbing trees and kicking a ball for hours?' we cry. Well, another reason to return to the trees or hit the park or the beach is that they're reasonably quiet. No machine-gun fire from the joystick station, no annoying cartoon backchat from the screen - just the opportunity for kids to hear themselves think, talk, laugh and breathe. It's not as if our 21st-Century kids are suffering from a lack of stimulation. In yoga and many other health modalities there is a whole area of wellbeing based on ‘prana', the breath. In our busy lives, it's becoming almost impossible to hear ourselves breathe. Why are we doing this to ourselves? What's so bad about some peace and quiet? Why have we become slaves to the noisy intrusive telephone - on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week? It's not as if we're all poised to perform vital brain surgery. Perhaps there's a fear that if we're not tuned in we'll miss out somehow. We'll be disconnected from the mothership. But maybe we're missing the distinction between aloneness and loneliness. In not taking some time to be quiet and listen to our own thoughts, are we avoiding thinking about how we're not that happy or how we'd like to be doing something other than what's seemingly laid out for us between 8am and 5pm? Is all this noise and bustle an avoidance of facing what's really going on for us? It's a simple art, a quiet pleasure, and it takes many forms: reading books, going on bushwalks, gardening, contemplating the day over a cuppa; taking a moment to consider if our lives have become so noisy and social because we're somehow reliant on external stimulation to make us ‘happy'. Well, try turning things off for a few hours and burning some noiseless essential oil while you quietly sip your coffee or tea over a good read, and then compare and contrast. You might find that the sound of one hand clapping is a lot more pleasant than two. |
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