Are awkward silences just in the mind?

Question

I mean it's not the silence that makes 'awkward silences' awkward because you can have very pleasant, comfortable silences. What is is that creates that atmosphere? You would think they ARE just in the mind but you can really feel the tension.

I know this is a random question but can someone please explain what makes us feel awkward silences. I have a few ideas myself but I'd love to hear what you think.

Answer 1

I feel awkward silences either when I've said, or had something said to me, that just falls FLAT or is mis-timed, and there doesn't seem to be any appropriate response.

Example:

Me: [forgetting that husband died two months ago after a long bout with cancer] "Hey Janet! How's your husband doing?"

Janet: "uhhh..."

It's a social gaffe, typically, and in MOST cultures the 'rules' of social engagement are usually bred from childhood and understood by BOTH parties, so that the awkwardness is not just felt by one person, but by both.

On the other hand, if the silence is perceived by one of the parties to be something much less complex ["she can't hear what I'm saying because she's wearing headphones" or "she doesn't speak my language"] then there may be awkwardness felt by only ONE of the parties.  

Answer 2

First you have to enquire within your own mind why you feel uncomfortable with silence.  

If you ask this question to other people who do not understand this process, but will answer as if they do then this will only further confuse you.

Being confused you wanted to be certain, and a mind that seeks to be certain when its confused only maintains confusion, doesn’t it?

Is it not a fact that choice indicates confusion?  Where there is clarity there is no choice.

We as people have been condicioned through society to escape and be distarcted from ourselfs at all costs.  We feel uncomfortable to be alone with our own thoughts.

We do anything to escape from it, put music on, watch t.v., films, read, be in other peoples company, almost anything to avoid the silence.

But it is only in these silent pockets that we can come close to understanding ourselves.  So we have tobecome comfortable with our silence.

Like water which can clearly mirror the sky and the trees only so long as its surface is undisturbed, the mind can only reflect the true image of the self when it is tranquil and wholly relaxed.

How anxious we are to find an answer to our problems.  We are so eager to find an answer that we cannot study the problem, it prevents our silent observation of the problem.

The more we think over a problem, the more we investigate, analyse and discuss it, the more complex it becomes.

If you don’t understand your own thinking, which is self-knowledge, whatever you think has very little meaning.

Without first knowing yourself, how can you know what is true?  Illusion is inevitable without self-knowledge.

To observe, to watch, to give you whole attention to something beautiful, your mind must be free of preoccupations, must it not?

It must not be occupied with problems, with worries with speculations.  It is only when the mind is very quiet that you can really observe, for then the mind is sensitive to extraordinary beauty, and perhaps here is a clue to our problem of freedom.

What is important is to be inwardly very simple, very austere, which is to have a mind not clogged with beliefs, with fears, with innumerable wants, for only such a mind is capable of real thinking, of exploration and discovery.

If you want to take a long journey, you  must carry very little, if you want to climb to a great height, you must travel light.

A mind that is preoccupied is incapable of solving the problem.  Do you see that?  It is only the unoccupied mind that can be fresh to understand a problem.

Understanding is now, not tomorrow.  Tomorrow is for the lazy mind.  The sliggish mind, the mind that is not interested.

A mind that has understood the whole movement of thought becomes extraordinarily quiet, absolutley silent.   How can the mind understand when it is agitated.

Scilence comes when the mind is no longer seeking, no longer caught in the process of becoming.

The mind can never experience the new, and so the mind must utterly still.

Because we are inwardly empty, dull, mediocre, we use our relationships and our social reforms as a means of escaping from ourselves.

As the pool is still when the breeezes stop, so the mind is still with the cessation of problems.

Most of us want to be made dull, and habit is very effective in putting the mind to sleep.

To observe and understand the self, I don’t have to read Freud or Jung or go to some so called specialist.  All I have to do is look, as it is all there in front of me.  Authority arrises only when I am confused, when I am in disorder.  It is like the person who says they are looking for their glasses, when all along they had got them on their head.

Counselling creates among people the impression that they need authority to correct the disorder.  When we reject authority we have much more energy.

Answer 3

I think it is because most of our conversations in our society are so "purpose-driven".   Depending upon who we are talking with and the context, there seems to be something always to discuss.

Once the purpose has been fulfilled there seems to be nothing else to say.  Both individuals share in the ensuing anxiety and that shared anxiety is what constitutes an "awkward silence".

Other emotions that people share that are not just "in the mind" are panic, fear, terror, anger, etc.

Answer 4

YES IF ONE WANTS TO ATTAIN A MATURE FEELING  

Answer 5

I think it's because we are often so preoccupied with what we are going to talk about, or say next, that when it gets quiet, our brains start to "panic" from trying to think of what to say next! At least that's the way I am!

One of my friends always says in a moment of quiet: "I LIKE to create awkward moments, because I think they are funny!" lol! (He's a total nutjob!..Everything he says and does is hilarious!)

Every time I have an awkward silence now, I just think of him and I start to crack up! LOL! ;D

Answer 6

A mixture of mind, will and emotions.

Sometimes it's gut instincts.  Other times it's missperceptions.  I believe also that if we didn't have this God given gut instinct, that we'd fall victim to every high pressure salesman and conman in existence.

That being said:  Some people pick up on almost everything, while others don't seem to take in danger.

I know it may sound mad, however I do believe that there is, not necessarily in a Judeo - Christian way; oppossing forces at work in the universe.  Such as dualism.  To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  I'm sure all these things affect our sense of well being, bringing tension or peace.

Source(s):

Some Newton, some home spun philosophy that seems logical to me.