Explanation of the "translation effect"
Aug. 29th, 2005 12:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flamingswordI've been in three wrecks wherein the car was totalled (or should have been) and I've never been hurt. Everyone I know has some similar story of something that inexplicable doesn't go wrong for them- 'luck' you might call it. Because we are different, the world doesn't work the same way for any of us. Because of the differences in experience and essence, no two people understand the world in the same way. We all speak from our own vantage on the world, and so we all speak a subtly different language.
When you and I are talking you're speaking in your language and I'm hearing it in mine. And there are . . . translation gaps. Some of what you're saying I get, and some of it I think I get and it's not quite accurate, and some of it I'm not going to understand at all. But it's easy to forget that the two languages aren't the same. It's easy to think I know what you're talking about, until there's some obvious misunderstanding. And then we can feel the distance between us, and even though the distance has been there all along it still leads to frustration.
Now some have a take on this that says that if we try to all have the same experiences and live as alike as possible that maybe we'll understand each other better. Maybe if we aren't unique we won't feel so alone. And this is a beautiful wish. But like a lot of pretty wishes it's neither possible to live within a mold nor would it make us any more able to reach one another. Part of what makes us want to reach out to other people is that difference. Getting to know someone is always an adventure. If we're alike then we know each other aready, even having never met. And then what you have is interpersonal apathy. Where's the fun?
So you are stuck between two fallacies, whenever you communicate with someone: thinking that you understand, and thinking that you want to understand. And despite the impossibility of the situation, we all keep trying because even though it sucks when things get screwed up it's fun trying, and it's beautiful when you do manage those rare glimpses of the world through the eyes of another. So you have to challenge a lot of assumptions, and put a lot of effort into understanding the differences. And sometimes you have to have faith, make the leap, and trust your intuition that says that the gap isn't as big and scary as it looks. You have to recognize that change is taking place all the time, and that there's no way to account for it, because all true growth is a leap in the dark.
And still we talk, make friends, influence the world, change our minds, rearrange all the pieces of the puzzle. And it's confusing, but it's our nature. And when we come to terms with it, there's a sort of peace there, knowing that you haven't been duped, that everyone isn't doing it on purposes, that you're only as confused as everyone else. There's no conspiracy, no plan to keep you in the dark, it's just how things are. Things have always been this difficult, wars have always been fought for reasons of this same miscommunication, human interaction has always been precariously balanced, always been a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that wasn't there.
And then you look around with eyes of wonder, that you're here at all. And sometimes you find the cat anyway.
When you and I are talking you're speaking in your language and I'm hearing it in mine. And there are . . . translation gaps. Some of what you're saying I get, and some of it I think I get and it's not quite accurate, and some of it I'm not going to understand at all. But it's easy to forget that the two languages aren't the same. It's easy to think I know what you're talking about, until there's some obvious misunderstanding. And then we can feel the distance between us, and even though the distance has been there all along it still leads to frustration.
Now some have a take on this that says that if we try to all have the same experiences and live as alike as possible that maybe we'll understand each other better. Maybe if we aren't unique we won't feel so alone. And this is a beautiful wish. But like a lot of pretty wishes it's neither possible to live within a mold nor would it make us any more able to reach one another. Part of what makes us want to reach out to other people is that difference. Getting to know someone is always an adventure. If we're alike then we know each other aready, even having never met. And then what you have is interpersonal apathy. Where's the fun?
So you are stuck between two fallacies, whenever you communicate with someone: thinking that you understand, and thinking that you want to understand. And despite the impossibility of the situation, we all keep trying because even though it sucks when things get screwed up it's fun trying, and it's beautiful when you do manage those rare glimpses of the world through the eyes of another. So you have to challenge a lot of assumptions, and put a lot of effort into understanding the differences. And sometimes you have to have faith, make the leap, and trust your intuition that says that the gap isn't as big and scary as it looks. You have to recognize that change is taking place all the time, and that there's no way to account for it, because all true growth is a leap in the dark.
And still we talk, make friends, influence the world, change our minds, rearrange all the pieces of the puzzle. And it's confusing, but it's our nature. And when we come to terms with it, there's a sort of peace there, knowing that you haven't been duped, that everyone isn't doing it on purposes, that you're only as confused as everyone else. There's no conspiracy, no plan to keep you in the dark, it's just how things are. Things have always been this difficult, wars have always been fought for reasons of this same miscommunication, human interaction has always been precariously balanced, always been a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that wasn't there.
And then you look around with eyes of wonder, that you're here at all. And sometimes you find the cat anyway.
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My Understanding of the Sacred
Date: 2005-08-29 07:04 pm (UTC)The very gap you speak of is why I play so with language, to pry forth the secrets it conceals, and remind myself that it is a quicksilver, amorphous thing to carry such weight & importance.
no subject
Date: 2005-08-29 07:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-29 09:33 pm (UTC)It's a wonder we can communicate at all... is how I usually verbalize the above thought-process.