Consequences of our non-verbal actions

Whenever most of us speak we are speaking two languages without ever realizing it. Of course we are speaking English, but we also are speaking volumes more with our hand gestures. And yet, there are others who can not only use these two forms of communication but they also incorporate body language and facial expressions to offer the listener a full HD experience. To prove the importance and necessity of non-verbal communication I performed a little science experiment. It was a relatively simple experiment but it yielded fascinating results. I tried to hold down my mother's arms to her side for two minutes during a conversation with my brother about what she did the day before. She didn't last twenty seconds before she stopped and said she couldn't continue. She elaborated every miniscule detail with her hands and arms for added emphasis. According to my mother the importance of her gestures to her speech was almost like needing air to breathe, she could absolutely not do one without the other. While I would like to say that gender and other external stimuli are partly responsible for this behavior I also do believe that it is some part the individual's character that contributes to the utilization of non-verbal communication.
My mother has her funny way of expressing herself non-verbally and over time I found I share a similar trait when I talk. For example my brother sometimes to express himself his voice gets louder and squeakier as his emotions take a hold on him. We all have our own unique way of doing things, our daily routines, or sometimes they are more commonly referred to as our OCD tendencies. It may not be logical or even productive but they have to be done. In a way or non-verbal communication is a religious tendency that cannot be deviated from. The non-verbal communication is key to our relationship with others, it is done a certain way and our unique quirks make us who we are.
The gender gap is a optical illusion, sometimes it can be a hop, skip, and a jump away, and other times it feels like we are crossing the Grand Canyon on foot. These nonverbal cues between males and females are misinterpreted more often than we would like. But the funny thing is these miscommunications are two sides of a coin. Both parties are saying the same thing but it sounds different, it sometimes sounds like the exact contradiction, this is of course in the heat of the moment. After the dust settles everything becomes clear as day. But yet there are those other times when the miscommunications occur because we get complacent, and we assume. These assumptions are usually insignificant occurrences in everyday life but the wars that result from this are epic. Yett despite these epic battles we still need these skirmishes, they make us feel alive, and realize what we have could be gone in a moment. And that is what makes us realize the consequences of our actions, although sometimes we realize them too late.

The Secret language of Subtlety

A shrug, a nod, a look, how many times have we seen these hints and sped past them like when we blow a stop sign? We know they are there but we just might have "overlooked" them or flat out ignored them. Couples around the world can attest to the secret language of subtlety. When their partner is in a bad mood the know it, like a disturbance in the force, or a sixth sense, they can feel it. But how do we not only identify these signs but understand what they mean for a particular person. Lord knows how many wars have been fought under the same roof over a "miscommunication." Something gets lost in translation and the entire message gets corrupted. We find ourselves time and time again looking at the aftermath asking, "What the hell went wrong?" The time we spend with our life-long companions, friends, coworkers, and most importantly family is crucial to decoding this language. I may feel great, enthusiastic about the day, or I might feel like crap. My external emotions might be telling a different story. I could be perceived as tired, happy, or angry. Our appearance is in the eye of the beholder, how they see us is how they will act towards us.
Our emotions sometimes seep through our facade and we "wear them on our sleeves" but most times, most of us are efficient at masking the pain. We wear our poker face and bluff our way through the day, who knows, we could have been in excruciating pain but nobody was ever the wiser about it. This apart of playing the "political game" being able to fool others around you into thinking one thing but your hidden agenda could be another thing entirely. I personally do not play this game. I despise it and I get tired of it. I waste enough of my time and energy trying to survive every week, why do I want to add more weight to carry?
Everyone is different with how they show their emotions, but one thing holds true for all of us, we show our emotion, the key is recognizing when it occurs. My aunt looks pissed, always. At a party, she sits with her arms crossed and he jaw set. At a family barbecue, she sits with her arms crossed and her jaw set. When she watches T.V., she sits with you guessed it her arms crossed and her jaw set. Now walk up to her and do or say something remotely, humorous and she will bust up laughing. Why? Because that is how she expresses herself. She wears that badass, tough cookie, take no crap, facade but she really is a funny and interesting person. We all have our secret languages, if you want to figure it out it doesn't take a P.H.D. just get to know the person and try to see things from their eyes. What are they thinking, how are they feeling, what is going on in their life? These questions race through my head when I see someone sitting there and I figure, "what the heck, I might as well go say hi what's the worst that can happen." It works for me, who knows socialization could be the secret decoder ring we need to solve this.

Another Brick in the Wall

Being multilingual is something short of being cursed. Because once it gets out that you are affluent in different tongues, it changes people. It changes the perception people have of you in either a negative or positive way. Why do people assume that because we may speak a number of languages that it makes us an automatic professional linguist? I used to work at Walgreens and once it got out that I spoke Spanish everyone who used to know how to speak "some" Spanish suddenly had a severe case of amnesia. It was amazing how many calls I got no matter what department I was in because I was the resident "translator." It made me feel good at times and other times it pissed me off because almost fifty percent of the time those hispanic customers only needed the restroom opened. I had my job to do on top of handling the customers that lazy workers passed on. So should English be the recognized language of the world? I believe that if it was there would be less confusion amongst different cultures but there goes the diversity of the world right out the window. How many stories do we have about a small miscommunication with some other culture we encountered? It makes for a good story to tell your friends or family. Well, kiss that goodbye.
The world would be economically strengthened because of the interactions we would have with one another but who is to say that English has to be the world standard? Who died and made our language so important? English is one of, if not the hardest languages to learn but it is possible to have it as the world standard. The world is a small place and this global connection would make a trip around the world equivalent to walking to your fridge to grab a microwavable meal. Something special would be lost. Why travel across the globe when you can have the same experience going anywhere else? Sure the sights aren't duplicable, but the people and the food are. It would just be another brick in the wall of life. We need this diversity it keeps the variety in our life, otherwise we would get complacent and just downright lazy. The people, the interactions, the sights, sounds, smells, tastes and experiences make this life worth living. Why give up this curse, this gift of being different from a cultural standpoint? Some would argue that just because there is a global unified language that doesn't mean that we cannot have different languages. Think about that for a second. If that were true then why do immigrants to the United States teach there children, who are born here, to only speak English? Because those immigrants were ostracized for being different and having to learn English as a second language so they try to make life "easier" for there children. And in doing so it slowly erradicates the cultural landmark of that race. Their unique language becomes a thing of the past, so wouldn't a parallel occur if English became the global language?

The Domino Effect... or something like it...

The difficult thing about writing is organizing all the crap that is going a mile a minute in your brain. Where to begin? This question has haunted me all my life when it comes time to write. But once I solve this puzzle the pieces just fall into place. Each idea stems from the next, like a symphony of various instruments coming together to form the most poetic sounds. But every so often there is a sour note. And in some cases the sour notes just keep on coming. For me, my life in English class has always been one of anonymity and one failed attempt after another. I never really appreciated the power of the written word. It was always just an assignment, I never knew what I could accomplish. But I was always on the brink, if I just learned that one elusive skill that everyone else seems to know...
My English teachers in high school never really spent the time teaching me how to become a better writer. They always gave the same speech, that it was something that clicks, it will just come to you. So I figured I had a better chance finding the Holy Grail than I did getting a "B" in the class. Effort was not a question, at first. I tried and tried but always got the same result that I was so close my teacher told me. It was 11th grade and for the past two years I had the same teacher, Mr. McElroy, who taught me to loathe English with a passion. Almost everyday we had to to book work and grammar that was learned in grade school. Needless to say I did well in those classes but I did not learn anything in the advancement of my English writings. And in 11th grade I was being asked to write at a college level but was, "just missing it a certain uniqueness..."
The best I could achieve was an average score but then something happened that I did not intend. I started to emulate what I saw in movies, television, and other media outlets. I also copied what I read in magazines, books, anything that was inspirational to me. And it just clicked. I do not know how or exactly when, but it did, yet it was a only a flicker of a flame, nothing more. Things just started to fall into place, when I wrote I used such elevated diction that I was confused. Who was writing this? It felt like I was possessed by someone else and I was just witnessing what was happening. If I had to guess at what happened, I can attribute what occurred to a bolster in confidence. My voice came out when I was confident.
My voice, your voice, her voice, his voice, everyone's is different and everyone has one waiting to be tapped into. But once you find it, once you learn what you can accomplish, everything just falls into place, like a row of dominoes. And from then on it just becomes a matter of what the heck am I going to write about? And then the piste resistance, where to begin?