Last week, my brain and my mouth decided to square off against each other. My mouth won. So my brain retrenched, thinking a bit about why we say what we don’t mean, and what we can do about it. Let me walk you through it, so maybe you can learn something from my misstep.
If you have taken a communication (irony alert) workshop with me, you might have heard me discuss “the four things you say” when you speak. I’ll share the first two here: first is what you think you want to say, and the second is what actually comes out of your mouth. If you’d like the other two, I guess you can bring me in for a workshop—I know that I would enjoy working with you and your group.
But for now, I would like to lift the curtain on a moment when the gap between what I thought and what I said was piteously large.
Setting the scene: I am towards the end of a Microsoft Teams meeting with someone with whom I had not previously spoken. This wasn’t an ombuds-related call, but rather something broadly connected to my research into the history of gambling and casinos. And I thought I was doing pretty well. Both of us started making the customary noises signaling that the call was wrapping up. My interlocutor said, “Have a great rest of your day.”
Now, I meant to say, “You too! Talk to you later” or some variant thereof. “You too,” started to make it down my brainstem, but by the time it reached my mouth, all that came out was a curiously strangled, “You…” that sounded, to my ears at least, like a kitten timidly begging for food. I know a few things about cats that aren’t shy about sharing their hunger, and this didn’t have the caterwauling confidence of a fully grown cat that hasn’t been fed in, oh, twenty minutes, but rather the tentative song of a feline just learning that it runs the place.
I then locked eyes with the camera for some reason, probably looking like someone who has just missed the top rung of a twenty-foot ladder and realizes that they are about to go for a very short flight with a very painful landing. After what felt like a minute but may have only been a second or two, I hit the “Leave” button without attempting another word. The window vanished, following my dignity.
Two thoughts punched a quick one-two through my brain: “What was that?’ and “That was one of the funniest things I have ever seen.”
If laughter, as they say, is the best medicine, I won’t be getting sick for a while.
I don’t know exactly what happened there. It’s the kind of interaction I have had several times a day for years. And yet one fateful afternoon, I somehow short-circuited. I don’t know why.
When I’m talking with a workshop group about the daylight between what we think and what we say, I usually fess up to a 20 percent thinking/speaking gap, meaning that on average what I actually say loses about 20 percent of its wit in the process of going from brain to mouth. Reflecting on some things I have thought and said recently, I think I have been a bit too generous. And yet I have to find a way to make my living not just by communicating with people, but by helping them figure out how they can communicate more effectively. How, in good conscience, can I do this if I can’t even discipline my own words?
The only answer I find is that communication is always a struggle. We might not know what we want to say, or how to say it. To make matters worse, when we do get something out of our mouth, someone else might just hear what they want to hear, regardless of what we are trying to say. It’s a miracle that we manage to make say or hear anything clearly at all.
Who better, than, to help light the path than someone who has stumbled over it themselves? Often, those who are blessed with “innate” virtuosity can find it difficult to relate to those of us who need to work at their craft; “you just do it” isn’t the most helpful guidance, but it might be that when things come naturally to people.
So what to do when we have a moment like mine, when something comes out of our mouth that is unintended, unwelcome, or even unintelligible?
First is to have a plan. I assume that I am going to, at some point, not say exactly what I mean to, so when it happens I am a smidge disappointed, but not totally surprised. If it’s just a matter of stumbling over my words rather than being unable to speak, I might chuckle and say something like, “Wow, you can see how excited I am.”
Second is to make sure the right information gets out there. Imaginary dialogue between a physician and patient: “Now, it might be fun to put a cat on your broken wrist, but what I meant to say is that we’re going to put a cast on it.”
Third, we can try our best not to let our occasional, or even frequent, malapropisms prevent us from sharing our thoughts. If someone has never misspoke, I would bet that they are holding a lot in. Waiting until our words are confidently polished might save us some temporary embarrassment, but it means that we left too much unsaid. Unless we need to nurse our vanity more than we need to connect to others, that isn’t right.
Finally, by bobbling our words every now and then but not giving up, we give others the confidence that they can do the same. One could even rationalize that the occasional inarticulate bout is a public service of a sort, showing that it is okay to not be perfect.
Maybe, I now realize, that’s why I’ve decided to write about my experience. Before, I just had something that amused me and those who I re-enacted it for. Now, thanks to the wonders of processing things by writing about them, I perhaps have a glimmer of encouragement for someone who could use it.
Which is why I don’t get nervous about misspeaking, even in front of a workshop crowd. Yes, I can’t convey the material that I need if I am completely incoherent, but my overall aim isn’t to wow the audience with my verbal calisthenics, but rather to connect with them on some level. When perfection gets in the way of that connection, I will ditch perfection every time.
And hey, if we are on a remote meeting, you now have a good conversation starter. If you need a chuckle, I can even reprise my inexplicable moment for you.
So until next time, expect the unexpected, stay informed, and I’ll stay informal.
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