How I know I'm a headcase

I know I'm a head-case because it’s only when I write that I speak from my heart. I think a lot of you are head cases too. I mean that in the nicest way possible.

It’s not that I can’t speak, or speak my mind. Its not that I’m not thoughtful and considerate when I speak, or that I speak lies.  I just have to be careful, thats all.

Let’s take an example. I’m walking along the street talking with a friend about our relationships. Its a good chat, full of interesting turns and often it opens up into more intimate situations which have been bothering both of us individually. The conversation stays in the same relationships ballpark, but sure enough, as soon as you look closely at something, anything, a whole new world of that thing appears before you, awaiting explanation. So we go down conversational paths that we will never retrace our steps on, and thats fine. In doing that however, it means I want to give my best at every point.

And there is a lot to play for. Firstly, I want to explain myself to the best of my ability and impart any “wisdom” I may have locked away, accessed only now when the key to unlock it is found in our conversation. I want to do that to be of some help to my friend. Secondly, I want to be clearly understood, so that the most is squeezed from whatever I am saying and new routes of thought are unlocked in my friends mind. Lastly, I want to help myself understand my own situation, often best done through verbalising. I want my words to correctly transfer the mountain of information in each thought, the past, present and future meaning specific to us.

Thats a lot to put on words. And yet this is the job.

Added to that is a timing issue. I can only speak for myself, but the thoughts that I want to form into speech in the moment have a certain process, and because there is a process (which can last an entire 2 seconds), by the end, I’m tired.

It’s not having the thought thats the problem, it’s putting it into words thats tricky for me. As soon as I try to get the words out of my head to my tongue (not a long trip!) they have morphed into a watered down version of what I was saying, they have lost their bloom and I can’t save them. This has gotten to the point where I almost prefer to send my friends an email describing my thoughts on whatever subject we are talking about at a later stage. It will come out clearer and the value will be the greatest it can be. It has a better chance of living on. I have things to say, I just don’t have the words to say them.

I know I’m not alone. Woody Allen in a Paris Review interview said “Most of the things that I’ve written and published, I’ve felt that I executed my original idea pretty much to my satisfaction. But I’ve never, ever felt that, not even close, about anything I’ve written for film or the stage. I always felt I had such a dazzling idea—where did I go wrong?” This was a man who has given us a truckload of genre defining movies, scripts and performances, and yet here he is saying, I have a problem getting the work out. He goes on to say “You go wrong from the first day. Everything’s a compromise. For instance, you’re not going to get Marlon Brando to do your script, you’re going to get someone lesser. The room you see in your mind’s eye is not the room you’re filming in. It’s always a question of high aims, grandiose dreams, great bravado and confidence, and great courage at the typewriter; and then, when I’m in the midst of finishing a picture and everything’s gone horribly wrong and I’ve reedited it and reshot it and tried to fix it, then it’s merely a struggle for survival. You’re happy only to be alive. Gone are all the exalted goals and aims, all the uncompromising notions of a perfect work of art, and you’re just fighting so people won’t storm up the aisles with tar and feathers. With many of my films—almost all—if I’d been able to get on screen what I conceived, they would have been much better pictures. Fortunately, the public doesn’t know about how great the picture played in my head was, so I get away with it.”

I love that analogy of a movie production to describe the path of a thought. Thats often how our thinking processes can appear. What starts as a thought, a fresh instance of a new reality, knitting together our experiences, whats happening around us in that very moment and thoughts of a new future, almost instantly gets shrouded in the production details; how, why, what will it cost, and worst of all, what will people think? Unless you are appropriately trained, it’s usually extremely soon after having the idea that Father Fear shows up to get in the way, and thats where things get complicated. Even the smallest ideas, the smallest pieces of advice, can become an overwrought tangle of issues unrelated to the thought itself.

This is best evidenced by the fact that most people spend about 87.65% of their waking hours winning fictional arguments with people and things that have yet to, and in all likelihood wont, happen. It’s easy to get swamped in the current of a conversation in which you are playing both protagonist and antagonist. Either way, you win! Its just a pity that that doesn’t happen in real life. The seamless process of Question A leading to Question B leading to Result C never really happens. In reality we all have to deal with spaghetti conversations, and spaghetti thoughts. The conversations in our heads though often look like a bowl of spaghetti in which each piece of spaghetti also looks like it’s made of spaghetti. Round and round we go.

Whats to be done? I have 2 solutions, neither of which take any kind of training, mental or otherwise. They just require a little awareness.

One is to simply be present in the conversation. We have all been in those conversations where the other person is obviously waiting for you to finish what you are saying so he can get to what he is saying. I do it, we all do it. What’s hard, but worthwhile, is to try and focus on whats actually being said, then waiting, taking a moment and then responding with the best we got. Thats it.

That naturally leads to the second method, and thats to just be happy with what you have said! Despite having spent all this time talking about how I want to get and deliver the best in every conversation, part of me also feel that there is no point stressing over it. Conversation is an art, yes, but it shouldn’t also be a job. In the spirit of the eastern tradition, conversations should be left where they lie, take nothing more from them, expect nothing from them.

I know I’m not a head case, but it feels like that when I over-think things such as what I just described. In a sense, trying to make sure you are at your most effective and useful in conversation is a gift in itself. It shows that you care about what you are saying, that you want to contribute to the shared dynamic and help. So next time, don’t worry about what you are going to say next. Just worry about being present, being aware and listening with intention.