[Jagriti] Spoiled by Adjectives (Part 1)

The moment we put an experience into words, we kind of cage it.

If I tell a man who has never eaten mango - that it is a kind of sweet fruit - then i am caging the whole experience of eating mango.

The only way to know Mango is to eat it.

Rest all is limiting.

When you say something is easy - you cage it in "easiness". Or you tarnish the purity of my experience with this easiness about it. Now my mind is continuously directed towards the easiness (or difficulty) of it.

So what do we do - suspend adjectives?

If you look through a really good novel or a movie - both will without explicitly telling you - that the girl is scared, make you feel scared, just as the girl is feeling.

So her experience of "scared" becomes your experience of being scared - and makes us experience the experience rather than being told what the experience was.

So I propose - The more we keep things to experiential, let our five senses take over - the more OPEN an experience is. If we try to define it, label it, qualify it, we kind of put a full stop to it and atleast file it in a particular category - cage it.

Does that mean expressing is counter productive?

Or rather the way we express can itself be limiting. And this is coming from a desire to complete an experience.

I have found leaving an experience , with a number of "what else" gives children an idea that there is much more.

One of my favourite dialogue in Jagriti sessions is that we will talk about it more in future sessions.

Whether we will or not is only to be seen (i hope nobody is keeping a record)

The objective obviously is to keep windows open. Not get bound by Adjectives.

Adjectives (and adverbs) are the staple diet of beliefs - they thrive on them.

sample these

The girl was painting

The little girl was painting

The girl was painting hurriedly

Hope you can see how the adjective and adverbs affect the actual observation (experience).

Adjectives and adverbs are like gift wraps put by people over the original gift.

By asking how and what questions, we can unwrap the experience and help the child come in touch with more OPEN experience.

The assumption here is that the richer the experience, the more the child will learn and enjoy it.

what say? Comments in whatsapp group please

warmly

Aditi-Ratnesh (Ph: +91-98450-45833)

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