The long, arduous, and, at times, seemingly impossible, quest to attain true inner silence is, nevertheless, the only way our hearts become that rich soil—receptive to God’s Word, and thus bearing the hundredfold. It is only when we have acquired this inner silence—and quelled the inner chatter of our restless minds and stilled the insidious background commentary of the demons—that the Lord will (as with Jeremiah) extend his hand, touch our lips and say: See, I place my words in your mouth. None of this will happen, though, until we begin to curb and discipline our compulsive tendencies to speak and indulge those frivolous conversations that keep us strangers to our own hearts—rendering them rocky ground, and soil filled with thorns. Therefore, whoever has ears ought to hear, heed, and act!