People often ask me in which language I think or dream. Being raised in The Netherlands and living there half of my life, my first verbal language is Dutch. 38 years ago I came to Israel, my primary language of communication became English until I learned enough Hebrew. Our kids grew up with Dutch and Hebrew, and five years in the Dutch educational system enabled them to speak, read and write in both languages.
The truth is, I think in Dutch, English and Hebrew. It just depends on the context.
I always wondered why I think verbally.
At least that is what I thought . . . because I was convinced that thinking meant thinking in words.
I would look at my dog and wonder “does she think at all”? And if she does, does she think in words as well? And how do babies think? Or do they only ‘learn’ to ‘think’ when they grow and acquire language?
My sister (those of you who are familiar with our discussion groups know her) is working with deaf immigrants in The Netherlands and teaches them Dutch as their second language. She uses NGT (Dutch Sign Language), a language she studied in university. She tells me that she sometimes dreams in Dutch Sign Language. (By the way, every country has its own Sign-Language, it is NOT a universal language).
Sign language is not ‘verbal’, there is no sound. It uses signs and gestures and facial expressions to communicate a “DABAR” – an essence, a reality, a certain thing. (See insight: the Reality of DABAR in your Syllabus)
The Hebrew word for “Word” is “DABAR” which means much more than a word-label. It means a Reality that can be experienced. It means the Thing Itself, the very Essence of the very Thing or Object or Experience.
We are able to comprehend the word, the sign or the action that ‘names’ the DABAR we communicate in any language that we know and ‘speak’, read or write.
We can express a DABAR with a “word”, a “sign” or an “action”. Through each one of them we can experience the MEANING of the DABAR. That is when we experience the Reality Itself, the Real Essence of this specific DABAR.
The sound of a word, a written word, a sign, or an action, they are all tied to the same “THING”, and thus represent this specific Reality. They do not represent different aspects of it, they communicate the same thing in different languages.
We tend to think that spoken and written words are the same language, but nothing could be farther from the truth. Written words, once we have learned to read, are automatically and instantaneously translated into the sound we knew for years before we could read the word.
Reading and writing is not even the same language, he skills and the neural pathways involved are very distinctive and the information is processed in a very different way. This is true for hearing and speaking. This is also true for seeing and signing.
Pictures and videos are another way to communicate the same thing. I can draw or make a photograph of something and I send it to you and you know what I am communicating. And again, we immediately connect the picture to the word, spoken and written.
Movement is another language. Think of body language, of dance, all ways we express what Our-HEARTS are Seeing and Experiencing.
All of our senses speak their own language and every DABAR communicates its essence in all these languages. “All of our senses” does not mean only our physical sensory senses but every sense that we possibly have.
Taste, smell, texture, pressure, temperature, size, posture, light, color, density, movement, time, speed, space, hunger, thirst, etc. are all languages, and so are feelings, emotions, sensations, thought, beliefs, previous experiences, stored memories etc. Some of these we can express in words, many of them we can’t, but we do experience them and they are an absolute part of the Essence of the DABAR, the Reality.
I dream in all three verbal languages as well – Dutch, English and Hebrew – whenever there is any verbal aspect and content in the dream, and then again the spoken language depends on the context of the dream.
But much more than verbal, my dreams are vivid experiences with vibrant imagery, sensory, and feeling. That is because the “Left-Brain-OX” is asleep, and the Right-Brain-LION remains wide awake. (The-HEART Never Sleeps and is Never Unconscious. . . )
It is amazing how complex this all is. Our-HEART truly is a ‘mind-boggling’ piece of equipment.
It is the IMAGE-Maker that connects all the dots, understands all the above languages, and saves us from getting lost in the forest of all the language details.
It is the IMAGE-Maker that speaks the universal language of humanity and makes one coherent whole of all the parts.
It connects all the specific languages at the Speed of Light to the internal IMAGE that is already stored in The-HEART and then we SEE, we KNOW, we comprehend.
The IMAGE-Maker speaks the Language of The-HEART and that is the only language that can make sense of all the others.
So what is YOUR language?
ALL of the above . . .
The-Language of The-HEART is IMAGES
Once you were fluent in The-Language of The-HEART. And then you were “taught out of it” in order to speak the language of the adults around you.
Communication would be so much easier,
so much more honest,
so much more authentic
if we ALL remembered . . .
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