With over one million words in the English language, finding the right words to say can often come as a struggle. It’s proven that our brains think quicker than we could ever possibly speak or write. Personally, I’m surprised that there aren’t more of us. The ones who vomit words all over the place before we can stop ourselves. The ones who press send on a text before trying to edit it down. The ones who can take hundreds of words to get one simple thought across. We have so much we want to say, but we just get so tongue twisted in how to say it.
There are times where we may know exactly what we’re trying to convey and still end up hemming and hauling over how to speak the words. The ‘ums’ and ‘uhs’ flow out of our mouths and ellipses (…) are no strangers in our text messages. Unfortunately for us, word vomiting doesn’t just occur in face-to-face conversations. No, texts, calls and instant messaging are all fair game when it comes to word vomiting. Try being reduced to 140 characters on Twitter. That’s some tough stuff. Whether we know we’re doing it or not, it’s difficult for us to stop it from happening.
You may be wondering how word vomit occurs and I wonder that myself. In fact, I’ve found that mine has gotten ten times worse recently and would love to know what caused that. If anyone has a cure, let me know. I’m currently convinced that I’m going to be stuck in this perpetual state of saying too much when very little needs to be said in the first place.
Part of the cause has to be who we’re trying to talk to. Naturally, those who we word vomit all over are those who are the ‘important people.’ Important people including, but not limited to, teachers, bosses, crushes, exes, those who intimidate us and those who we’re trying to impress. That sadly doesn’t leave many people out of the ‘important people’ category.
Situations also lend a helping hand in how horrible the vomit is. In a professional setting, it’s best to get the word vomiting under control as quickly as possible. No one wants to hire someone who can’t seem to talk. It’s situations in which we’re nervous or too excited where we start talking much too quickly and about basically nothing. For example; just the other day, I was texting someone to tell them I care about them. No big deal, right? Well, it came out something like, “I still care about you…after all this time…not that it’s in a romantic way…just…I don’t know. I care…I don’t know what I’m saying.” Not the best way to express my thoughts. My apologies to the poor person who had to get that text.
So this is for the Barry Allens ("The Flash"), the Kara Danvers ("Supergirl"), and the Felicity Smoaks ("Arrow") of the world. This is for those of us who may have trouble forming sentences and get easily flustered. You’re not alone. Together we fill the silence with our many thoughts and many words.
