Recently, I spent a week alone and in silence at the Benedictine Monastery in Atotonilco, in the desert near San Miguel de Allende.

On my first day, I was met by the Extern monk at the monastery early in the morning (the Extern is the one monk who is appointed go-between for the monks and the outside world). He showed me my little room, which was down the hill from the monastery church, and gave me a bottle of water. From then on, I was on my own.

For a week my only time-commitments were meals, eaten in silence with the monks: 8:05 AM for breakfast, 1:25 PM for comida, and 6:45 PM for supper. The odd times for meals have to do with the singing of the Holy Hours, chants the monks perform several times during the day, beginning at four in the morning: the Hours are scheduled on the hour; when they are over, the monks eat — which explains the peculiar start-times. In monastic life, where there would seem to be practically nothing to do, ironically, every minute counts.

Silence is not new to me. A few weeks after I graduated from high school, I went away to a monastery and lived as a monk for eight years. The first year of my monastic life was lived in silence…the entire year.

What happens when one is silent for a long period? The outer noise goes first, and then the inner noise starts to evaporate. Soon, quiet reigns everywhere, it seems. Time slows to a crawl. Sound becomes a curiosity — natural sounds, especially, like the flow of water or the rustle and sway of tall grass, become occasions for deeper listening and lead to a most profound inner calm.

Deep within each of us there appears to be a great well of health, abundance, knowledge, guidance. When we enter the silence and stay in the silence, we have the opportunity to come into direct contact with that sacred well. In that place dwells our True and Higher Self: It is that part of us that exists and operates in a place where there is no time –– no past, no future, only the present moment. It is the part of us that is connected to all of consciousness. It holds the answers to all our questions, the solutions to all our problems.

During my week at the monastery in Atotonilco, the only activities I engaged in, beside meals, were walking around the property (which is huge), reading, journaling, and meditating. And resting. It seemed to be enough just being there and reveling in the solitude and quiet. I experienced a deep feeling of relaxation — a sense that every cell in my body and every circuit in my mind was in a blissful state of idle.

I also had the distinct feeling that my entire body and its emotional, mental, and spiritual envelopes were repairing and regenerating themselves. I knew I needed these rest periods from time to time. They are like the ‘rests’ in music, which give a song character and make it mean something.