“My Speech is imperfect. Not because I want to shine with words, but out of the impossibility of finding these words, I speak in images. With nothing else can I express the worlds from these depths.” - Carl G. Jung

    I find this quote resonates deeply within me. For my whole life I’ve struggled to find the right words, the correct phrase, the ideal response. I realize now as life moves on that this journey for words isn’t the best way of moving forward; It’s out of control or the idea that I can maintain over a situation, argument, disagreement, thought, etc. The reality of this, no matter your intentions, no matter how accurate your words are to you intention, the respondant will always react in their own, correct, way.

There is no dishonor within this feeling. Everybody carries the right to react and feel however they may. At times this can be quite difficult, especially if intention isn’t just misunderstood but entirely ignored due to someone’s reaction. We are all guilty of this. Don’t be mistaken I am not a man who stands above other men. I have misjudged from places of deep insecurity. Oblivious to the intention involved. The hurt is as equal in this realization as being misunderstood.

It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, ultimately. Chasing accuracy and expecting to hit the bullseye. I respect the effort; yet it’s time to speak from a place of truth. Not as an excuse to be rude or hurt, but to speak with trust in your intentions and the other person. The more we attempt to control the outcome, the more true the opposing outcome is. For me…this has been a common point of contention within myself.

With the ones I care about most, I always tried my utmost to speak around my truths taking into consideration how that individual will interpret my words, my intention, etc. Carefuly navigating that was always a fool’s errand. I know this now and find that simply speaking from a place of honesty, truth, and letting actions carry intention is the way. Controlling conversational outcomes is for the birds.

I always cared about how my intentions would be interpreted. Let’s face it some people live in their own worlds and no matter your actions or words, intention is never yours; its their’s. The beauty of this? That’s simply being human, and its good to still love people over it.

I have a close friend, who in a similar vein, takes this approach in life. He cares on precision of language and accuracy. He wants to leave nothing up for interpretation. I highly respect this approach, its more extreme than the trap I would fall into. But maybe his approach to precision is simply speaking the absolute truth? Could it be the adjacent step after my realization? I like to keep this in mind whenever we have conversations about communication. He doesn’t like it when people assume, and he never wants to assume himself, but human emotions do not follow a logical track. There is a depth that is difficult to understand at times. The “why” to the responses.

Although I also lack the artistry to express this point: I believe that in a conversation of two people, no matter how precise language is to your intention, emotions, opinions, beliefs, etc, the respondant will always approach it from within unknowningly. The same would be true to the speaker. The desire to leave nothing up to intepretation is just as much an emotional reaction than the respondants assumption.

I’m not here to advocate being a complete asshat in conversations, but sometimes, no matter how hard you try life will always deliver you failure. Not to bring you down, but to offer a lesson in understanding.

I might not be a good writer, but I do find solace in expressing extremely complex ideas and feelings in creative writing. Not as an exercise, but when the moment arrives. Some friends would say I speak vaguely at times, but that’s because I’m too hung up on giving some weird allegory/verbal image to express an idea. Likely because my vocabulary sucks, but also because saying something is “melancholoy” or “tragic” doesn’t quite express the idea. Most people view tragedy negatively, but I see it as a more complex idea.

The Hero’s death is not commonly viewed as tragic, but when framed with the journey can one only express the loss as sadness? If you look at the reasoning behind the sacrifice you can see it isn’t a tragedy, but I would disagree. It is. Not sad, not dishonorable, but a tragedy simply for the sacrifice, journey, and safety provided. I could also just be romanticising the idea of a tragedy beyond something inexplicably sad. I just don’t believe that tragedies are simply just sad. Nor melancholy, or lacking in a heroic journey. I think the word “tragedy” stands above the most simplistic of feelings, similar to the word “sacrifice”. Its also quite possibly that I am merely not using the correct word. Is it ‘poignant’, ‘sublime’, ‘cathartic’, ‘bittersweet’, ‘elegiac’?

Maybe ‘elegiac’: tragic beauty. It’s important to view even the most distressing, distasteful things within the human condition as something wonderously beautiful. That’s the inherent essence of what being human is…imperfect in the attempts at perfection.