Can you hear the hissing of summer lawns?

⦿ Fun, Concentration, Team Building, Relaxation.

There is a proverb from Burundi that says, “too many words darken your ears. Therefore, take a silence break from time to time. The purpose of this Online Energizer is to ‘discover’ as many sounds as possible, together (or alone). This can be a competition – who recognizes the tiniest sound – but first and foremost this Energizers work as as an exercise in attention.

Before the game begins, one participant is declared timekeeper. The other participants now close their eyes. Optionally, they can even lie down with their heads on their desks (though they may be covering an ear that way). This concentration exercise probably works best sitting as still as possible.

When playing this game in an online meeting everyone should be un-unmuted. That way you will not only hear sounds of your own room – but also those of the others!

The game leader calls out “start”! Three minutes later the timekeeper stops the game, and everyone writes down which sounds they have perceived and remembered. The one with the most sounds gets to read them aloud!

You’ll really land in the room you’re in, when you pinpoint your ears to each sound!

Tips for more practiced participants and groups:

• • The role of the game leader can be expanded considerably. All participants can be set to mute in this particular variant – and the game moderator can turn off his or her camera. Now the game moderator creates (for example) 10 sounds. Who recognizes the most of them?
  • The game moderator can also give each location per participant 1 minute of sound time. What do the other participants hear in that room. (Turn up the volume – including the mic!)
  • As a Zen exercise, the competition element is obviously not of great importance. The main thing is to surround yourwself with the the sounds in – of –  your own room. To be well aware of where you are. Do you hear a lot of traffic? Birds singing? Neighbors? Perhaps you can sit down, and try the exercise in a different room!
  • Consider this Energizer an experiment. In which room do you work the best? One where it is quiet, or a room with a lot of ‘noise’? The great Dutch writer Simon Vestdijk is known to have put on a dust vacuum cleaner to better concentrate on his work!