{"id":583,"date":"2012-10-08T10:47:56","date_gmt":"2012-10-08T15:47:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/?p=583"},"modified":"2012-10-08T10:47:56","modified_gmt":"2012-10-08T15:47:56","slug":"you-heard-what","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/musings\/snip-its\/you-heard-what\/","title":{"rendered":"You heard what?"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">What you say you heard isn\u2019t what I think I said.<br \/>~ <a href=\"http:\/\/t.co\/TJBJIqq2\">http:\/\/t.co\/TJBJIqq2<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; C.G.Ayling (@CGAyling) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/CGAyling\/status\/255333814589599746?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 8, 2012<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.x.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Language is crucial to modern man, without which we probably would never have developed further than extended family units.\u00a0 However, effective communication is much more than mere words arranged into an understandable order.\u00a0 Indeed,\u00a0my suspicion is that during primitive man\u2019s early development non-verbal signals received significantly greater attention.<\/p>\n<p>As language improved, the need for these other skills gradually diminished, reducing them to the subliminal.\u00a0 However, they\u2019re still there and we still rely on them.\u00a0 We just no longer pay them conscious heed, perhaps even training ourselves to ignore them \u2013 from the mistaken belief that words are all we truly need.\u00a0 Sadly, the only time this comes close to truth is in the hands of masterful writers.\u00a0 For the rest of us, the things we say are often a jumbled, incoherent mess understandable only due to instinctual understanding of the non-verbal communications accompanying the gibberish pouring from our mouths.<\/p>\n<p>According to my wife, and she is right far more often, I said this \u201cI can\u2019t believe how bad these pictures on the TV is.\u201d\u00a0 Quite rightly, Suzanne called me out \u2013 gleefully repeating what she thought I had said.\u00a0 (Perhaps a little less gleefully than I would have, had it been her who made the error, but there was significant delight.)\u00a0 After listening to her echoing what she thought I had said, I indignantly exclaimed, \u201cI would never say that!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And indeed, I never would \u2013 intentionally.\u00a0 Unfortunately, sometimes our mouths betray our minds, uttering things we aren\u2019t thinking. \u00a0(Take that as an admission if you like, subliminally it seems to be one&#8230;)\u00a0 After a few enjoyable minutes of indignation butting heads with glee, and neither gaining ground, my youngest child walked in.<\/p>\n<p>Appreciating the value of a first strike, I immediately turned to Julia and said \u201cMom says I said \u2018<em>I can\u2019t believe how bad these pictures on the TV is<\/em>.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 Julia\u2019s disbelieving eyes sufficed to halt any further explanation.<\/p>\n<p>Appalled, Julia turned to her mother and asserted \u201cDad would never say something like that!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Since appalled disbelief more closely matches indignation than glee, I immediately claimed victory.\u00a0 Was I right, or was Suzanne wrong?\u00a0 In truth, I think we were both correct \u2013 sometimes what you think you\u2019re saying isn\u2019t what the listener hears.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Language is crucial to modern man, without which we probably would never have developed further than extended family units.\u00a0 However, effective communication is much more than mere words arranged into an understandable order.\u00a0 Indeed,\u00a0my suspicion is that during primitive man\u2019s early development non-verbal signals received significantly greater attention. As language improved, the need for these [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-snip-its"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cgayling.com\/malmaxa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}