We have all been thrust into a strange new reality, one where whatever assumptions we had about how we lead our lives, individually and with others, have been shaken like the “snow” in a snow globe.

My pal Scott Berkun wrote “It’s Time to Learn,” a blog post spurred by a compulsion to respond to Marc Andreessen’s misguided “It’s Time to Build.” And while I agree with Scott, I realized that I had a different, though related, take. Because “learning” feels like work, and I know many of us barely have energy to manage what’s expected of us right now.

These shaken assumptions lead me to feel that It’s Time to Reflect. Too rarely do we stop and take stock of our lives, our behavior, our relationships, our time. When things are chugging along, and things seem good enough, there’s no impetus to do so. But in these times, we owe it to ourselves to step back and reflect. Learning suggests looking outward. Reflection looks inward. No need for research. No worrying about finding legitimate and trustworthy sources. How do I feel about my job, friendships, relationships, and connections with broader society? Are there things that I assumed that this experience shows I now feel different about? What will I do about that?

This is hardly an original thought. But I felt it worthwhile to suggest that we not worry about productivity, about self-betterment, about progress, and instead prioritize reflection, and the new considerations that emerge from it.

By and large, I don’t take truck with religion. Born and raised an avowed atheist, I had trouble understanding how it could be valuable — my knee-jerk reaction was that it does little more than narcotize.

Maturation is a wonderful thing — understanding the colors, shading, textures of what’s out there. Part of that maturation was to try to impose less of my notions on other things — to let them be. In the course of this, I became more aware of the Quakers (also known as the Society of Friends) and their approach.

The Quakers are Christians, but don’t hold that against them. From what I can tell, most Quakers can’t stand Christians, either. Quakers have no clergy. Quakers think that, yes, Jesus was a child of God, but hey, we are all children of God. He had some great ideas, but wasn’t particularly special. Quakers are pacifists. In American history, Quakers are often the first to do that which later on becomes understood as “right” — they were the first fiercest abolitionists.

A key element of Quaker practice is the weekly Quaker meeting. Apart from occurring on Sunday, it’s similarity to other Christian practice ends there. In Quaker meeting, the group sits, silent. Again, no clergy, so no sermon. The only time a Quaker speaks is when the spirit moves her. A Quaker is asked to speak only if it will improve upon the silence. This is a substantial threshold. Entire meetings may go by without a sound. A kind of group meditation. Encouraging real reflection.

In the chattering world that is media, internet, urbanism, that notion of silence becomes even more powerful, meaningful, useful. It’s made me wish that everyone took to heart that request — speak only when it will improve upon the silence.

(This is not to suggest that I follow such an axiom. I’m one of the worst silence-fillers I know.)

When I stopped writing on my website a couple of months ago, I was surprised at how… concerned some people were. “Why did you stop writing?” I realized that, at the time, I really hadn’t anything to say. I was posting out of obligation to an audience, not because the spirit moved me.

I was also growing increasingly frustrated with the echo chamber effect of weblogs. A meme drifts out there, and then 38 different people post their take on that meme, and they all link to each other, and, as a reader, you bounce from post to post, the semantic feedback growing until it’s deafening. I needed to remove myself from that for a while. To prune a tree. To look on as my g/f and another friend weeded my garden. To get licked in the face by a dog. To prepare my taxes. To watch work out while watching TeeVee.

I’m back. I probably won’t post as much as I once did. (Though today is an exception! Suffice to say that when you stop writing, the ideas well up.) I’ll try to make sure that, when I do, I improve upon the silence. And if you return to this site, and there’s nothing new, I ask you to reflect upon that, appreciate that silence, before you continue through your bookmarks.

Peterme.com is back on line. And while I had all sorts of high-falutin’ thoughts about how I wouldn’t blog again, I kept not getting around to the essay writing and other stuff I thought would take its place. I’m lazy, I guess.

I did, however, accomplish one thing I wanted to do before returning to write peterme. I launched the Beast Blog, a multi-author East Bay regional weblog. I believe that there’s a shining future in regional weblogs. They can be an amazing community resource. Particularly for communities too small to warrant a daily newspaper, but too large to be satisfied by a weekly 4-page newsletter.

And, so’s you know, I’ll be fiddling with peterme.com for a while, evolving the design, etc. So it might look different every time you return.