Some of my favorite moments with my clients are the silent ones.

In between the endless strings of questions I ask them (“How often do you use the tweezers?” And, “Where do you stand to pack the lunches?” And, “Do you wear underwear to bed, or just pajamas?” And, “Would you be thrown off if the mugs lived in this cabinet, or would you prefer that one?”) and casual conversation about our favorite skincare products or restaurants or spice medley, there is very often silence. There’s us, focused on our respective tasks, not worrying about filling the space with words.

Initially, some clients feel they need to keep the string of conversation going.

“No, no; that isn’t the way this works,” I say by being completely at ease in silence.

There are times to talk and there are times to be quiet, and being able to tell the two apart is critical to your wellbeing. There are times to speak your opinions and there are times to keep your mouth resolutely closed, and being able to decipher between the two is vital to the health of your relationships.

When you talk just to fill the air, you end up saying things carelessly, mindlessly, and unnecessarily. You stammer and ask stupid questions that I, for one, don’t care about answering. You make hurtful remarks, whether or not you intend them to be. You insert your opinion on another’s decision where you needn’t. Or, you sink to your lowest conversational tool: gossip.

Maybe the dawning of the proverbial comment section has lured us into thinking we always need to say something. Maybe we’ve been opening our mouths without giving enough consideration to what we’ll let out of them since we evolved into a species capable of speaking language. Either way, silence remains underrated.

Silence does not detract from an exchange, it amplifies it. It is the requisite contrast to conversation. With speech, we stimulate and relate. With silence, we reflect and process. We need both; two sides of the coin that is connectedness.

To make people feel comfortable around us, we do not need to supply them with an endless string of comments, remarks, and questions. We need, instead, to let them know:

Here, in me, is a person with whom you can be silent, some of the time. Here, with me, is a place where you don’t have to constantly Be On, where you don’t have to worry about words I’ll thoughtlessly sling your way. Here, with me, is a relationship in which you might not always get an immediate response because I’m going to allow myself to think carefully before I speak. Because I’m going to decide if I have an answer rather than decide what my answer is. And here, with me, is a place you, too, won’t be expected to always have an answer at the ready. Here, we are reveling in perfection of the duality that is speech and silence. Connection to other and connection to self. Reveal and reserve. Here, we are two people at peace in each other’s company.