I have heard complete silence only once in three years. For about two minutes. (I used to love silence more than breathing). The rest of the time, it's been like being in a concert, right up against an amplifier, being surrounded by sounds and voices that make you feel small and belittled and degraded. All of the things I collected. A cacophony. An utter shambolic cacophony. Was just speaking to a woman who was telling me that a person she knows has eight voices; awe inspiring for surviving that. She works in mental health and did a workshop on simulating hearing voices by wearing an Mp3 player. And she was telling me how this exercise changed her view of the world. And the utter relief she had of being able to take the player off. I remember the horror of not being able to stop the voices and of feeling at their mercy, yet one day, we may declare a truce. Obviously, this part of my brain is trying to teach me something and they are not going to go away for the time being. The things you learn in the noise. The things you try to learn in the noise.