A conversation is much more than words

Not long ago, my siblings and I went quickly, from an ordinary conversation about a current event into an unexpected argument. It did not happen because anyone refused to listen, nor because anyone lacked love or good intentions. The unravelling was quieter than that; we were simply speaking different languages..I was speaking the language of feeling, trying to give shape to what the event had stirred within me. My brother was speaking the language of reason, searching for steady ground in facts and evidence. My sister was considering what it might mean for the wider world we all inhabit. Each perspective; emotional, logical, and social held its own kind of truth. Yet each truth was being translated into a language the others were not prepared to hear..We argued because from where I stood, logic felt like silence in the face of pain. To my brother, emotion seemed to drift beyond what could be known or proven. My sister was still considering the larger implications. We were not necessarily disagreeing about the truth. We were approaching it from entirely different directions..In conversation with oneself.Only in hindsight did we realize that we had been having different kinds of conversations and reconciled, as brothers and sisters, as people who love and care about each other often do. However, that might not always be the case..Perhaps, then, before we speak about something consequential, we need to pause and ask what kind of conversation we are actually having. Is this a conversation of emotion, where what is needed first is empathy? A conversation of logic, where coherence and evidence must be established? Or a conversation about the larger social landscape, where we must step back and consider the world beyond ourselves?.And perhaps this is where understanding might begin, not with finding the perfect words, but with recognizing the language being spoken across from us. Emotion longs first to be met with empathy. Logic seeks coherence before conviction. Broader questions ask us to widen our gaze. When we answer each other in the language we are being spoken to, nothing essential gets lost in translation..Willingness to speak the language of the soul sitting across from us gently takes the conversation from the head to the heart . And once the conversation enters the heart, love speaks and ends all arguments.