In the past few month I started to become more aware of language, mostly how I use it. I was already mentioning before about my complicated relationship with language. I speak a few languages but none of them at this point is totally fluent. I always thought of it as a super power, it gave me flexibility of movement between different modalities, but what also happened is that it put a veil over me, over my awareness. When it comes to language, I am an intuitive learner. I arrive to a new place and relax in the language, absorbing what is circulating around me, apply logic to make sense out of it and play with it. I have little fear of making a fool out of myself so learning goes pretty quickly.
Besides the improvement of my vocabulary and becoming more precise and nuanced in my choice of words, piling up words on top of each other is one of the habits that I need to tackle.
Especially since I noticed that words serve as an escape plan from an open and engaged dialogue. I do see some improvements in a short time though. I notice that I use less words to fill up the emptiness and allow more air to enter the conversation. Keeping silence was always a problem for me. I find it a very noble and satisfying experience to be able to feel comfortable with less words. But definitely I need to keep on working on it especially in conversation. Writing seems to be able to absorb more than speech. Now as I am writing it, I am thinking that perhaps there is a correlation between my decreased need to speak and these daily drifts.
In order to better understand why I pile up words, I came up with the following scenarios.
My argument is weak and I am trying to reinforce it with additional clarifications. Patching with words so the structure can hold. This scenario is an unfortunate sign of intellectual weakness and instability
I am in the middle of a though process and I am using the situation to gain clarity on the subject. This scenario is a nice one. If this happens in the right environment, it can lead to great insights.
The argument I am making is complex and needs a lot of words to bring the message across. Also a good scenario. In case I actually know what am I talking about. Otherwise see bullshitting.
I am trying to escape contact and speed up the time. This scenario is also not optimal but has little to do with subject matter, referring to psychological condition.
I feel uncertain about the strength of connection and try to use language to make sure there is no breakage of the bond. This scenario also points to insecurity and overly present need for contact confirmation.
All of them are unfolding in the background and my conscious awareness isn’t always there to recognise them. But the more I notice the more I can prevent it from happening. What worked for me, is to stop the conversation and openly tell that I lost connection and I want to reestablish it. Every time I did it, for a brief moment there was a slight surprise but eventually I felt more involved.
I would like to pay more attention to words and use language in more conscious and meaningful way. I also started to notice different peculiarities in my use of language. In terms of physical experience, some words feel strange when I say them. A few stand out more prominently, words of appreciation, love and gratitude feel present and slightly uncomfortable. There is a beautiful ambiguity to language as well. Perhaps, tightening some loose ends and becoming more skilful will help me to explore this ambiguity in its fullest. I like how my relationship with language transforms, it feels alive and playful. And what can be a better proof that language wants to play than Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo - a sentence that is actually grammatically correct.