Usually at one point every year, I lose my voice.
Unfortunately, and I suppose fortunately a little bit too as I discovered this
happened this week. After catching a cold, my voice had been on the downhill. I
figured that I could let my voice rest before I totally lost it, or wear it out
until it wouldn’t work at all. Being the talker that I am, and figuring that I
would rather rest my voice only when I had to, I wore it completely out. Like, couldn’t get a sound out when I woke up Thursday morning wore it out. I made a
little “I lost my voice, so I can’t speak sign” and decided that not using my
voice wouldn’t stop me from communicating that day.
I tried this out starting at lunch time. The children
reacted with
a. disbelief and begging me to talk
b. thinking this was hilarious
c. being deeply concerned
I first tried communicating with mime, after realizing that either I am very bad at charades or everyone else is really bad at guessing, I attempted writing things down. But, this takes a lot of wasteful paper. This is when I moved onto just typing messages onto my iPhone and sowing them to people. The kids loved this, and it was probably great for them to practice a little reading comprehension. I had fun typing them out messages, and then having to show it to each boy individually if he had heard the question or not, they needed to see what the answer was.
Later that day when I was helping take names for some dentist check-ups, one of the girls Sonia (a 10th standard girl who is an absolute gem) saw my “can’t speak” note, and took it from me right away. When she handed it back she had written “We will be praying for you to get your voice back! Feel better.” I thought that was so incredibly sweet of her and I am sure her prayers were part of restoring my voice.
As I spent my time in silence on Thursday, I had a lot of time to think about how amazing communication is. Not only do we have language which is incredible on its own, but there is so much more to the way that we communicate with each other than just through words. There is facial expression, body language, touch, eyes, everything about the way we act communicates how we feel and react. I hear so many volunteers come to India and express their extreme frustration with being unable to speak the same language as the people. Certainly, I feel this same frustration at times too, but I also see it as exciting. Too often we rely on words to express how we feel, when our actions can say so much more. We seek some sort of verbal confirmation that we are on the right track or to know that we are on the same wavelength as our neighbors, when if we would pay attention to what the others around us are doing and how they are reacting we would know. It was, in a way, a gift that I was unable to speak on Thursday. God works in interesting ways, and I think that this was his way of giving me a small glimpse of how sometimes if I pay less attention to what I am saying and what others are saying to me, and more to what I am doing and what others actions are in return, I could learn so much more and probably speak (you know, when I have a voice) with much more wisdom.
a. disbelief and begging me to talk
b. thinking this was hilarious
c. being deeply concerned
I first tried communicating with mime, after realizing that either I am very bad at charades or everyone else is really bad at guessing, I attempted writing things down. But, this takes a lot of wasteful paper. This is when I moved onto just typing messages onto my iPhone and sowing them to people. The kids loved this, and it was probably great for them to practice a little reading comprehension. I had fun typing them out messages, and then having to show it to each boy individually if he had heard the question or not, they needed to see what the answer was.
Later that day when I was helping take names for some dentist check-ups, one of the girls Sonia (a 10th standard girl who is an absolute gem) saw my “can’t speak” note, and took it from me right away. When she handed it back she had written “We will be praying for you to get your voice back! Feel better.” I thought that was so incredibly sweet of her and I am sure her prayers were part of restoring my voice.
As I spent my time in silence on Thursday, I had a lot of time to think about how amazing communication is. Not only do we have language which is incredible on its own, but there is so much more to the way that we communicate with each other than just through words. There is facial expression, body language, touch, eyes, everything about the way we act communicates how we feel and react. I hear so many volunteers come to India and express their extreme frustration with being unable to speak the same language as the people. Certainly, I feel this same frustration at times too, but I also see it as exciting. Too often we rely on words to express how we feel, when our actions can say so much more. We seek some sort of verbal confirmation that we are on the right track or to know that we are on the same wavelength as our neighbors, when if we would pay attention to what the others around us are doing and how they are reacting we would know. It was, in a way, a gift that I was unable to speak on Thursday. God works in interesting ways, and I think that this was his way of giving me a small glimpse of how sometimes if I pay less attention to what I am saying and what others are saying to me, and more to what I am doing and what others actions are in return, I could learn so much more and probably speak (you know, when I have a voice) with much more wisdom.
As a treat for reading through my ramblings, here are some pictures from Sharmyla's wedding. I was blessed to work with and become very close with Sharmyla when she working at Rising Star, and I was honored to be given a personal invitation to her wedding and get to see her again. I bought a new sari just for the occasion.
The ceremony was lovely and Sharmyla looked SO PRETTY. As soon as I walked into the reception Sharmyla and I both gave each other the biggest smiles ever. We were always cracking each other up when we were working together, so it is no surprise when I got to go have my picture taken with the bride that it took extra long because we had to try and keep ourselves from laughing so we could hold a pose for long enough. I am so blessed to call her a friend. I loved getting to dress up for the occasion and going out for the night to enjoy such an exciting cultural event.
peace. love. and silence.
No comments:
Post a Comment