Using Language at Ease
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Dear forum users,
I am new to GS and to the forum, and have introduced myself in the Intro section.
I would like to expose my current difficulties in using language, in order to gain some insights into the nature of this 'problem' and hopefully hear expert advice from the students of GS.
I often have difficulty in expressing my ideas or putting into words what I know or have just learned. I feel a feeling of unease in coding and also in decoding language.
I am sure that I don't have any critical brain deficiency or problem because I have always had and 'normal' and happy life with sane relationships. I also did satisfactory well in school, and even qualified as a sound engineer a couple of years ago. Still, could not learn easily even though I am an intelligent person.
This difficulty in using language at ease has not stopped my progress and development as a human being, but because I am a very social and highly expressive and communicative person, I feel the need for being able to express myself verbally at a higher levels, with ease. Because we are an organism, if I am not able to use language to convey what I need, I feel that some charge is accumulated in the system, throwing me out of balance. Due to my experience with spiritual practices I am able to deal with this charge satisfactorily, but would still like to master the 'verbal' level.
One friend told me that our inability to understand a subject or to communicate properly is due to misunderstood terminology. These misunderstood terms accumulate and create emotional charge that produce many common symptoms. If one clears these terms, he is able to understand anything, anything at all!
I experience that by looking up words in the dictionary my ability to use language and communicate has improved. I can communicate better and with more efficiency, and I feel able to understand anything, as long as I clear the terms.
Now that I have shared my situation with you, please allow me post some questions. If you could either answer them, or provide insights into these language difficulties based on your experience, would be very valuable, and possibly change my life.
1- I have only been able to read Science and Sanity, which I really like, up to chapter VI on structure, and intend to finish the book in due time. Because of this I have not come across the theory for my situation there. Does Korzybski present solutions for this?
2 - Is the ability to express ourselves verbally with easy a natural result of taking up the work of Mr Korzibsky, or there is something else we have to learn?
3 - I also intend to 'master' grammar, because I like to talk and write properly and efficiently, it gives me pleasure. What do you think about the study of grammar in relation to this?
4 - I grew up in a village where the structure of the language is very primitive and people in general are not very developed in any level. Only in the past few years I have been developing my self, and in respect to the intellect, I feel as if my abilities, as characteristic of a sane human being, have been dormant because they were never exercised due to the cultural environment. Today, by studying GS, defining words and revising the way I use language, I feel my brain is starting to work, "oh man, I have a brain, and I can use it!", and sanity is being gradually an slowly recovered.
Any thoughts on this?
To finalise, I would like to thank you for your time in reading this, and hope that I am not sounding boring or making you waste your time. This is a very important subject, and I see many people like me, whose intellectual abilities are dormant, but they are in oblivion.
I am aware of the nature of this site and do not come here with a certain type of 'asking for help' attitude, which is common, but to hear technical thoughts into problems of this nature. I think that this forum is appropriate for such an enquiry because of it being based on General Semantics. Please kindly correct me if I am wrong.
Love and Light,
Luis Medinas -
Hi Luis,
First off, your writing strikes me as having a high quality and as quite sophisticated. Despite feeling you have difficulty using language "at ease," in my opinion you write very well, and you seem to communicate your feelings and thoughts well, at least above.
It's hard for me to say how GS might help you in using language with more ease. One thing it will probably give you is a bit of an ethical standard when communicating your ideas. For example, when you speak, you may find you want to align your words better with "the territory." As a result, you might say something, then correct yourself if you feel you've expressed yourself in a way out of alignment with "the territory." I do this a lot--revising my speech to be more consistent with general semantics principles.
The more you practice this, the better you get and the easier it becomes. I have found that writing in E-Prime, or at least in observance of GS principles, was key in internalizing GS and thinking more easily along its lines. Writing slows down your thinking processes to allow you time to consider how you want to represent your thoughts and feelings; the editing process during or after allows you further time to consider how better to represent your thoughts and feelings. Eventually, I found with practice that instead of having to write-then-edit to make a statement more in line with general semantics, I simply wrote without the need of editing after! That is, eventually I was rehabituated from writing in my old "non-GS" way to writing in the new "GS" way, and I less and less often wrote in the old "non-GS" way.
All the while, my thinking was getting rehabituated, too. I less and less often thought in terms of absolutes, and more and more often noticed when others "erroneously" insisted in speaking and writing in absolutes. Similarly with thinking "with certainty." The more I edited out absolutes and expressions of certainty, the more I eventually simply wrote without them, then eventually thought without them.
Grammar is a subject largely unrelated to general semantics. In other words, grammar teaches something that general semantics doesn't specifically address. Grammar teaches proper sentence construction and the like. Grammar is mostly a practical subject though sometimes it gets aesthetic. For example, sometimes a statement that is grammatically incorrect may still have communicative value and "get the job done." General semantics overlaps when you think of, say, the extensional devices mentioned in the "Introduction to the Second Edition" of Science and Sanity. Requiring the use of extensional devices in sentences could be thought of as advocating a particular grammar. I'll leave that for you to ponder.
As for your sanity in recent years, since I don't know you, I can't comment on your relative improvement. However, I wonder if in "using your brain more," what you speak of is "developing your critical thinking skills." You make me wonder if for years in your village you simply took what people said at face value, and that in more recent times you've started to think more critical about what you'd hear people say. General semantics helps to get people thinking more critically about our own language as well as the language of others, holding them to the standard of (scientific) fact when evaluating verbal claims. That is, no longer do you let people claim anything they want; you start to hold them to a scientific standard: "Would science back up the claims they're making?"
Those are some reactions to what you wrote. I hope you found value in this reply.
Ben -
Dear Ben,
Thank you for your attention.
To be able to communicate my ideas more ethically is by itself a very good thing. This is especially useful when we are discussing delicate subjects. An accurate map makes more sense. I am already using it to the best of my current knowledge.
Thank you for sharing your experience in applying GS principles.
"...the new desirable semantic results follow as automatically as the old undesirable ones followed." [Science and Sanity, C.IV, p.63]
According to Korzybski (and also to common sense) the principles have to be applied in order to show results.
In regards to the grammar, I think I understood what you meant. That a person might have good grammatical skills but still use a 'wrong map'. Is that what you meant?
I'll have to review ''extensional devices" later, in order to understand what you meant by using them in sentences.
I have developed a more critical thinking, that's true. And because of GS, a more scientific one also. An overview of the process of abstraction also helped me in thinking, learning and communicating a little better. I hope Korzybski offers more details about this process further in the book, (how we learn stuff, how we know what we know, etc.).
I was also curious to hear your comments about misunderstood terminology, that I mentioned in the first post.
Btw, I have to 'finish' studying Science and Sanity to really understand what the author is talking about, and to foresee its application.
Luis
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