January 15, 2014

January 15, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

Can you, who reads this writer's writing, understand what this writer wants to and has to say? Can you be a listener instead of a reader? Can you hear the tone of what he is trying to say? Can you acknowledge the immense difference between what is said and what is written? Can you go back from written words to spoken communication, to identify what must be said instead of written? If this is possible and this author thinks it is, we must speak about matters which so far have only been written about, but which have not been spoken about. If speaking about writing is necessary, then what people were writing about was an attempt to say something.

We really had wanted to talk, not to write. We only wrote, because talking was not possible. If talking would have been possible, we wouldn’t have written. We write because talking was dismissed and devalued. Talking is too overwhelming, too confrontational, too much in your face, too intrusive and causing too much trouble, but writing is convenient, easier to be ignored, because it is incapable of creating what only talking can create. We have settled for writing instead of speaking, because writing allows us to be who we think we are or rather, who we believe to be. Speaking forces us to rethink and change who we are and become who we can be. The force of speaking comes from the immediate confrontation with others which is missing in reading. Writers aren’t the so-called introverts, who don’t dare to speak. They are speakers who aren’t listened to. Writers aren’t at fault for wanting to speak, but listeners are at fault for not being able to  listen. When reader’s limits are slightly pushed, they no longer read. 

Why do we have sayings “he is like an open book” or “you can’t judge a book by its cover?” It must mean something to the reader. If the reader misses its meaning it is not this writer’s fault. The person who has no secrets, who lets you know what he or she is thinking or feeling, is like an open book. An open book is a book that can be read. The writer can’t make the reader open the book. How can you know what words mean by merely looking at them? Reading is more than just looking. Reading is privately speaking. Unless you think the words you read, you don’t and can’t understand them. The writer doesn’t make the reader think. The reader does the reading. The reader decides to think or not. This author has thought these words and has written them down, but it is up to the reader to read and to understand them. 

These words won’t have any meaning if they are not read by someone. To get to the meaning of these words, the reader must be willing to understand that this writing is about speaking. Speakers who push and challenge the limits of their audience are no longer listened to as well. Changing the way we think is about real communication and when we don’t allow it, communication is no longer possible. Instead, some watered down version of real communication, some written version of it, takes over the role of real human interaction. The written version of our spoken communication sets the stage for how spoken communication is supposed to be, but this limited version of how we interact during real interaction is bound to show many problems. 

One big problem is that we want to say more than what was written or what can be written. We wouldn’t be communicating if we didn‘t want to say more than what was already written. If what was written was all there was to be said, everything that was said was predetermined, but in our spoken communication things are less predetermined than in our writings. There are less restrictions on what we say than on what we write. Restrictions on what we say which were derived from what was written, are easier to break than restrictions on what we write that were derived from what we say. It is easier to be alive in our spoken communication than to be alive in our written communication. 

Spontaneity is lost more easily by a writer than by a speaker and is also more easily to be found back by a speaker. We look into the writings of others to find back our spontaneity, but we would be much better off if we looked for friendly speakers to re-connect us with our spontaneity.

Speakers will argue with their listeners to the point that listeners will become speakers. When listeners have become speakers, then speakers will also become listeners. As both are necessary for communication to happen, it is easy to see how difficult this is too be accomplished in written language. How often did it happen that readers became writers because they were challenged by writers? And, equally important, how often did writers become readers again? How often were the words that were written by others having such an effect on them that instead of speaking and writing, they were again listening and reading and understanding something new? It didn’t happen that often. Writing and reading hasn’t changed the course of human interaction as much as we often think it has. If it did, it was because we were reading about writers and readers who were speaking with and listening to each other. Since this seldom happens, there really isn’t that much to write about. Thus, we prefer writers over speakers and we imagine writers to be speakers, when in fact most writers aren’t allowed to be speakers anymore. The writer’s arguments are arguments that writers mainly have with themselves. They are not the same as spoken arguments.