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Hit 45 days of silence in a Buddhist monastery in Thailand and it broke my brain
I spent two months at a retreat near Chiang Mai last year, and for the first time in my life I didn't say a word for 45 days straight. What got me was how much that number mattered - like, hitting 30 days felt different than hitting 45, like I'd crossed some invisible line. In the west, not talking for that long is seen as weird or broken, but there it's just normal practice. Has anyone else hit a weird number like that where a milestone totally changed how you saw a cultural taboo?
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andrewt411mo ago
Right there with you. 45 days is a serious stretch.
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emma7681mo ago
Hit that 30 day mark myself at a similar retreat, and it really messes with your head how arbitrary numbers can feel so meaningful. It makes you realize how much of our social rules are just made up (like, why is three days of silence weird but 45 days somehow becomes profound?). The western taboo around silence is so tied to productivity and constant communication that hitting a big number feels like you're breaking some unspoken law of society.
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What's the cutoff where quiet becomes profound instead of just awkward?
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