The Subtle Art of Losing Words
I grew up in a house where the details were wrapped in silence. There wasn’t a big need for words, although sometimes we would have bursts of conversations about a book everyone loved or a movie we all just couldn’t get over, but our days were mostly silent, broken only by moments with overwhelming emotions. My sister would sift into my room, and I’ll complain that she’s messing up my bed sheets, and we'd just lay down in silence. If we had any conversations, I can’t remember the details. I do, however, have individual memories of being alone with everyone at some points, and it all involved silence. It seems like all my memories with loved ones involve silence. It’s in silence that I realised all our pinky nails are shaped like my dad’s and we all have our pointer nails shaped like my mum’s.
In the years since, I’ve lived at home less, it’s been easier for me to forget my words, and now I sometimes wonder how words get lost. Is it lost in between meeting and leaving, or maybe we lose it in the crevices between forgiveness and sin? You forgive so much that it becomes silent. Sometimes I also wonder if God is silent because of all the things He has to forgive.
To be fair I did have a stint of having my days filled with words with very little silence. I would find myself in situations where my learned silence was simply not acceptable, and I’d have a torrent of words. As a novice to the art of speaking, this inevitably led to a lot of overexplanations, followed by long stretches of silence. There was the constant battle of “to speak or not to speak.” I’d talk until my throat felt raw from the exertion, and I’d be drained for days. This of course meant I expressed my hurt with painful bouts of silence. I lost the need to use my words and reverted back to silence since I was unwilling to use my words in situations that hurt me.
On my end, I think my words lose their way on the path between love and indifference. It’s always been very easy to shut off my words, and as someone I knew once said, I turn off my "transmitters.” It’s like I don’t care to be understood anymore, so I stop communicating. Of course there’s the nuance of escaping accountability by going silent. However I recognize the irony of my silence being a representation of a lot of things; love, hurt, anger, punishment. Words get lost all the time, and without the guidance of context, they’re most likely irretrievable. In loving people, there’s a certainty that you need words; there’s literally a love language around the entire concept. But I have since come to the conclusion that to keep my sanity the best way is to love someone enough that offer them your words, and you love yourself enough that you keep some of your words to yourself. I still think the best kinds of people are those who know what to say at the right time and I decided that if I can’t be a master of words, I can hone the subtle art of losing words. Surprisingly it seems to be working. These days, I find myself using just enough words to be expressive without overwhelming myself. I recently spent time with a friend and for a little while we were just laying side by side in silence. For some reason, the moment reminded me of home, and I didn’t feel the need to fill the silence with words. There was an acceptance in the silence that even at the end of the day, as I was laying in bed, the single most precious moment was of us laying in silence. Like a perfect little bubble.
The whole point of this is that I’m happy to have come a long way from viewing my silence as a weapon. Of course there are people I’d give anything to never have to speak to again. There is a weightlessness in admitting that sometimes words aren’t needed in a situation and silence could in fact be a non damaging option. Silence is what you turn to when words aren’t enough, instead of scrambling and making a mess of a situation.
In conclusion as counter intuitive as it may seem, sometimes it’s quite okay to leave words behind, silence is a language too. Learn it.
