The Life in Language

by Starla J. King

 from Wide Awake. Every Day.

(used with author permission)

“Language is a full-experience expression with a life of its own, richly textured in all the senses, and worthy of rapt attention at all times.”

SJK 

Hearing the French language makes my knees weak. ~ I was in a local coffee shop writing when I heard several people speaking the unmistakable sounds of French. I put down my pen and, trying not to dash over to stand in the center of their group for better hearing, I listened with delight as they unknowingly dipped me into quiet bliss. ~ The round, sensual fullness of every word, accented with crisp consonants and voluptuous vowels of the French language, takes my breath away. I somehow feel the sounds on my tongue, their shapes melting to the back of my throat as I swallow their cadence like a river of warm, liquid chocolate. ~ Those few minutes remind me that language is not simply dead letters put in a row to form words and sentences. Language is a full-experience expression with a life of its own, richly textured in all the senses, and worthy of rapt attention at all times.

~~~

BRING IT TO LIFE!

As you go through your day today, listen—really listen—to the language people

are speaking around you.

Even if it’s your native language, hear it as though it’s new to you.

What treasures of experience did you find?

Starla J. King is a writing coach and author at OutWrite Living, LLC, a company she founded to help others access their inherent creative power as a way to live a more full, awake, open, meaningful, and impactful life. She also loves baked goods and the Pilot G-2 07 gel pens.