This month I pivot from one of the four aspects of the Great Principle Love and begin to focus on another aspect of the Great Principle, Truth. In truth I have to be to myself. That surely is a truncated way to begin!
A while ago I came across a college lecture by one Mr. Patrick Wilson. Some of you may be acquainted with him, I was not. He did catch my attention as his topic centered on communication. I believe a number of students in his young audience might be future professors. Someday they too could be in front of large groups of students possibly listening to their pearls of wisdom in a not too distant future. Mr. Wilson’s presentation appeared to be giving them the outline of a guide to help them be effective communicators, lecturers, public speakers, teachers or professors. Just to show you, that at my old age, my college note taking is still C+ sharp let me digress here and share.
Mr. Wilson- Communication-Lecture
Be aware of your verbal punctuation. We are all language processors. We most certainly are all story telling animals. Our ideas are like our children. Our ideas should flow from us in symbols and slogans. As we dance and twirl before our audiences surprise them with salient ideas that stick out before wrapping it all up in stories about how we did it! AND BE SURE to NEVER hide your hands! Pockets are not to be visited while telling your story! A lot more wisdom was imparted by Mr. Wilson during that lecture, but as I announced my note taking is average at best.
Seriously, I resonated with his premise that we are all story telling animals. As linear as our communications are, the narrowness of it is full of much energy, both negative and positive. Our spoken words are packaged beautifully with dialects heard and understood by families, neighborhoods, villages and cities of many connected people who learn to talk with their ears. Like music, the spoken word creates a symphony of notes that tell it all!
My pivot to Truth climbs the bean stalks of our words. We connect or disconnect by the truth as it relates to me and it relates to you. Shared dialects are the evidence that a people have shared time in ear shot of each other. If I didn’t just get a C+ I might have gone on to pahk my cah in Havad Yad! If you ever heard me speak you would say, why he’s wicked pissah, that boy who grew up near Boston, Dorchestah and Worcstah!
This month I am enjoying a novel written by the late great writer, Zora Neale Hurston. The novel is Their Eyes Were Watching God, copyright in 1937. My copy has a forward by Edwidge Danticat. He introduces the story in part as follows; a “novel about a woman’s search for her authentic self and for real love.” Hurston’s use of the local dialect spoken in Florida during the 1930’s is the signature lure (for me) of her novel. The following conversation between Janie ( main character) and her husband (Joe) is about a stubborn mule who wandered into town and bothered many for a few days. The mule, so cantankerous, no one had the courage to confront it. One morning the town awakens to find the mule on his rawbony back with all four feet up in the air. Note Janie’s husband Joe is the Mayor of this Florida town. They are discussing who is going to drag the dead mule out of the town center.
Joe: Why Janie! You wouldn’t be seen at uh-draggin-out, wouldja? Wid any and everybody in uh passle pushin’ wid they no-manners selves? Naw naw!
Janie: You would be here wid me, wouldn’t yah?
Joe: Dat’s right, but Ah’m uh man even if Ah is de Mayor,
Ms. Hurston’s ears were the note takers for her writing hand.
I feel their are many great writers that write with their ears leading their pens. Of course Mark Twain noted what his ears heard during the time he spent working and traveling the Mississippi.
From his classic novel, Huckberry Finn, I share here a few lines spoken between Huck and Miss Watson’s Jim one night they are on their raft floating by a town named Cairo.
Jim sings out: We’s safe, Huck we’s safe! Jump up and crack yo’ heels, dat’s de good ole Cairo at las’, I jis knows it!
(Huck) I says: I’ll take the canoe and go see Jim. It mightn’t be, you know and I shoved off,
He (Jim) says: Pooty soon I’ll be a-shout’n for joy, en I’ll say, it’s all on accounts o’Huck, I’s a free man,en I couldn’t ever ben free of it had’nt benn for Huck; Huck done it. Jim won’t ever forgit you Huck;
If you follow my posts on a regular basis I assume you are a fan of reading too. As a reader you probably can cite many wonderful story tellers, novelists, writers who effectively capture the dialect of the time and neighborhoods their characters live in. So many like Dickens, Margaret Mitchell, Melville, Margerie Rawlings, Colson White Head, and Steven King, (to name a few), apparently write with their ears leading their hand held pens.
On page 100 in Kathy Oddenino’s Bridges of Consciousness the following notion is advanced. Language is created by the five senses of man and does not take into consideration the multiple sensitivities of the rational and intuitive mind, the soul and spirit of man. Indeed language limits perception for man when that perception is focused upon the intellect/ego mind of man. The inner mind must be understood as an act of faith.
So another example about the narrowness of language. I get it. But this month as I lean against my metaphorical lighthouse, I focus on the music of talking in the hand of a wonderful novelist. As I listen to a spoken word I have to give my voice a rest. That spoken note of a word may trigger an assumption by me or you as we hear the tenor spoken. If we are surrounded by fear and negativity our assumption will be narrow and prejudiced. If we are positive and surrounded by same, we will assume the best. That warmth of a positive ear just might be the faith that unlocks the door to our inner self. What I do know is this; positive warm loving grace of words, spoken and heard, will be the Truth. Negative energy spoken or listened to will not be the truth.
Thank you for reading and be in peace and joy!
Don’t let your mask hide your smiling eyes, be safe.
Mark