What Happens When You Turn It Off?

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about sound. About playlists and podcasts, about background noise and deliberate silence. I’ve wondered how my mind spins when it’s carrying two soundtracks at once — the external noise, and the internal one, fighting for space.

Because the truth is: when one soundtrack drowns out the other, you lose the quieter voice. The one that speaks softly. The one that doesn’t shout.

Imagine sitting down to write. But in your ears, there’s a podcast going on about someone else’s life —- their ambition, their ideas, their trajectory. Your hands move. The words come. But it’s not yours. The page hums with someone else’s rhythm. Meaning gets borrowed. Not created.

That’s what struck me recently —- the idea of turning off the TV in your mind. The noise, the reruns, the endless commentary. It’s not just about silence. It’s about freeing mental real estate. Letting the internal channel get loud again.

Digital noise is not innocent.

We live in a world tuned to “always on.” Notifications, background shows, chatter threaded into every free moment. It feels normal. Natural even.

But that constant hum burdens the brain. It fragments attention and flattens the inner soundtrack. It replaces your cadence with someone else’s. It’s like trying to hear your own heartbeat with a radio pressed to your ear.

What happens when you press stop?

Silence isn’t emptiness. It’s a blank canvas. When everything goes quiet, something begins to happen —- slowly at first, quietly, almost reluctantly.

Thoughts return.

The internal monologue finds its footing again.

Your mind stops processing and starts wandering.

A phrase appears. A fragment. A thought you didn’t borrow. A thought that’s yours.

You’re not seeking isolation. You’re not hunting perfection. You’re choosing friction —- gentle, intentional friction. Creativity doesn’t live in noise; it lives in the space noise normally occupies.

So I’ve started treating silence as practice. Not a grand gesture; just small acts. Tiny interruptions to the world’s interruptions:

A walk without headphones -- nothing in my ears. No soundtrack. Just the world. The footsteps, the weather, the oddities you only notice when there’s no commentary layered over them. Letting the world interrupt me. Sometimes a thought surfaces. Sometimes nothing.

Five idle minutes -- in a queue, a morning coffee, when re-fuelling the car. No phone. No scrolling. Just standing or sitting there, letting the boredom stretch a little. Seeing what my mind does when it isn’t being fed. Letting my thoughts wander instead of being pulled.

None of this is dramatic. None of it guarantees brilliance. But the point isn’t output. The point is reclaiming the space where your thoughts are your own —- where the internal soundtrack isn’t drowned out by static.

Maybe the bravest thing any of us can do is turn down the volume. Not forever. Just long enough for the quieter voice —- the one that whispers rather than shouts —- to finally be heard.

Books I’ve been reading recently

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy, the anti-western, a truly fantastic read

More Everything Forever by Adam Becker, AI Overlords, Space Empires, and Silicon Valley’s Crusade to Control the Fate of Humanity

Red Rising by Pierce Brown

Memorable things I’ve watched lately

Say Nothing on Disney+, growing up in Belfast during the Troubles, and involvement in the Provisional Irish Republican Army. Gripping drama.

Harlan Coben’s Lazarus on Amazon Prime, psychological supernatural goings on.

The Man in the High Castle on Amazon Prime, I watched this series in its entirety when it was first released between 2015-19, but I re-watched season one before a planned re-read of PKD’s 1962 novel.

Dopesick on Disney+, focused on the epicenter of America's struggle with opioid addiction, starring Michael Keaton and Peter Sarsgaard.

Inspiring things I’ve listened to in the last month

Good Bad Billionaire - Diane Hendricks, Michael O’Leary, Lakshmi Mittal, Tyler Perry

Search Engine - American vs. China, Elon Musk’s Colossus data centre built for xAI’s Grok, the history of data centres in part one, and the ensuing controversy, in part two

News articles that inform me about The Dark Peak

A screen that's about the size of a human pupil packed with pixels measuring about 560 nanometers wide

Scientists uncover hidden ‘geometric code’ that helps DNA compute and remember

Biochips made from mushrooms rival power of manmade semiconductors

Colonial web-building in what's known as a chemoautotrophic cave. Much like the fungai and molon-tor, I imagine

Common salt helps create metallic nanotubes for high-speed quantum tech electronics

Battery-powered DNA robots that can signal, compute and release cargo

Scientists link two distant quantum dots using teleportation and frequency converters, solving a major hurdle for long-distance quantum networks

Genetically tweaked fungus is expected to shape the future of sustainable food

Common fern found gathering rare earth metals out of the ground

This Month’s words and pictures

From book one, chapter thirteen “Stripes”:

It's a definite possibly, said Van. Somehow, back in The Dark Peak, back in the day, I likely made some sort of history, I'm still not sure how myself, since it shouldn't have been possible, and maybe it weren't. It's not like I've ever pressed the matter. But I don't really doubt it either. I mean, look at me eyes, I showed you last night, you've seen them before.

Tha eyes Van? said Jarv, trying to follow the conversation.

Tha doant normally see, Jarv, this psycmask keeps 'em covered, but If I takes it off, and at that moment, Van did take off the psycmask, thee'll see.

And Van showed Jarv the dark green around his tattoo'd eyes, that bore a distinct resemblance to those who we might think of as a descendent of clown aristocracy.

Have a great December! 🎄