שמעון בנו
(של רבן גמליאל) אומר,
כל ימי
גדלתי בין החכמים
ולא מצאתי לגוף
טוב משתיקה
(פרקי אבות 1:17)
Shimon, the son of Rabban Gamliel,
said that he lived with wise people
for his entire life
and found nothing better for the body
than silence.
Ethics of the Fathers 1:17

Silence can be used when somebody leaves. This can be true in the case of a spouse, a child who has left home prematurely, possibly in anger, a friend, or even a date. Can silence help the issue?

There is no guarantee that silence will bring the person back to you. Your loved one may remain away.

However, there is much less of a chance that that person will return if you respond angrily which would be your natural tendency. After all, would you like to come to a person who is shouting at you and who is angry at you? Granted, the person himself who has left is angry but that is not the issue here. We're talking about having the person return.

There is of course another alternative and that alternative is to continue a dialogue, to leave the lines of communication open even though somebody has left. In many cases this is indeed more effective when a person has left than silence. Here a great deal of judgement is involved and it depends upon the situation, the individual situation. In some cases communication is better and in others silence is better.

Here is when it would be good to consult with others about the best plan of attack and if you want to use a rule of thumb it would probably be more likely to maintain open lines of communication. However, that rule of thumb is no guarantee of anything and there is no guarantee that it is best for your situation, as with any other rule of thumb. So it is difficult to predict if that is the right direction for you to go in.

Yet another compromise solution is a combination. Starting with silence and then with communication. Be sure that it goes in that direction and not the other way around. If you begin with silence the person may react in a way in which he wants your attention and that would be good and then once you have opened those lines of communication do keep those lines open. However, there are other cases in which it is best simply to remain silent and still in other cases you may stop this and double the silence and the subsequent communication can be dangerous and can be used skillfully it could leave a double message and a double message could be worse than anything. The recipient of the message can say does that person want to communicate or does that person want to be silent? And the reaction may backfire and be worse than using only one method. So although that could be more effective it could also be dangerously less effective and should only use the silence followed by a communication should only be used if you feel reasonably confident that you are able to handle it successfully.