Something that's been on my mind lately. I sometimes feel like human beings often feel this unnecessary need to verbalize and ask questions that are obvious just for the sake of conversation. Why do we do this? Are there other more effective ways for us to communicate?

Many of the revered yogis of India speak/spoke highly of silence. That it is a very health spiritual practice. I've noticed too that many native Americans speak very little unless there is something to be communicated. I feel like western society could stand to learn a lot from these people.

A Sufi quote comes to mind-

"Before you speak, let your words pass through 3 gates
At the first gate, ask yourself- is it true?
At the second gate, ask yourself- is it necessary?
At the third gate, ask yourself- is it kind?"

I feel like non verbal communication is one of the best ways to learn to communicate with beings from any culture or language. Why must we learn a new language, when we all perhaps share a deeper form of communication that doesn't involve "language"

From a trip several months ago I still have a voice that chimes in quite frequently telling me to "speak less". The very images/ideas I was experiencing in the original trip were that of Sadhus and Indigenous Americans.

Ultimately, what do I have to say? I am not that wise. What little wisdom I do have I feel is better used listening.

I think it is social conditioning to a large part... the talking too much. I think Westerners are taught early on that silence should be felt as uncomfortable and that leads to us all filling the silence with our babble.

Interesting. I totally agree with the idea of a more silent community. Some people would go insane ;]

I think they may already be insane and are just fending off it's arrival by babbling, lol.

Hehe

Thinking more about it though... language came to be and evolved for some extremely good reasons. It was a the impetus for even more human evolution and development IMHO.

Sure it does. Like everything, it can also be used for ignorant and pointless and destroying things also.

Look at hear-say, Rumors, lies. Media in general..

Right on... I suppose the question isn't "Should we verbally communicate" but more like "How much should we..." or "What should we verbally communicate about"

I think the question is what about.
The rest will follow.

Yeah. And its funny how, for me at least, once i started tripping with others this became immediately apparent and in-your-face. It can even spin some people into a bad trip via over thinking the situation and trying desperately to fill the silence for the sake of filling the silence and feeling comfortable...instead of just being



hey, me to

Interesting topic.
Reminds me of a trappist monk.

from wikipedia:
Trappist monks generally speak only when necessary; thus idle talk is strongly discouraged. According to St. Benedict, speech disturbs a disciple's quietude and receptivity, and may tempt one to exercise one's own will instead of the will of God. Speech that leads to unkind amusement or laughter is seen as evil and is banned.

This resonates... I think a lot of it is the ego, and not "being well seated inside one's self," a concept I am still learning about.

New Year's Eve, people were NOT well seated inside themselves... and kept asking me the most RIDICULOUS questions.. ranging from "Why are you wearing pants?" to "How are you?" Both seemed equally ludicrous ;-) No one would sit next to me just quietly for very long, not long enough for words to really come.

Does body language count as non-verbal communication? If yes, I bet it's just as powerful

Eye contacts, frowning, smiling, all sorts of facial expressions etc, hand and body gestures, non-verbal punch in the face, non-verbal kicking someone's teeth out, they do deliver powerful messages, don't they?

I had an LSD trip several years ago where this was the main focus of most of my trip. I kept wanting to speek, but would get stuck asking myself "Why am I going to say this?". I would have been upset if one of the others I was with started babbling and wouldn't stop. Which ended up happening, and the other two of us had to tell him to just relax and let the silence continue on. We tend to stick to complete silence and darkness when we do these sessions and I personally believe I gain most when my trips are kept silent. I have since that last experience been much less eager to speak out during debates amongst those around me and have attempted to stay away from engaging in meaningless conversations. I haven't been completely successful, but I am making progress with this. I find the topic to be fascinating, and do think a lot of people would benefit from having this particular type of trip.

This may be a bit off the topic, but I think even non verbal communication fits into the category of language - and we all have an interest in psychedelics.

This is the website of Diana Slattery - http://psychedelicsandlanguage.com/

I met and spoke with her at Psychedemia this past September and really found a lot of what she had to say super interesting as well as relevant to some of my psychedelic experiences.

Anywhoo... maybe it will be of interest so some.

Slattery's book "the maze game" is a fantastic read!



of course

Thanks for sharing in this thread everyone! I think it's a really fascinating topic and may be one of the next steps in human evolution (or perhaps an old step we lost along the way). Anyways, I think it's cool stuff!