Words have no meaning

A word, by itself, has No meaning at all.

Here’s a word : Dog!

All of you readers must have thought of ‘a dog’, but at the same time no two dogs would be the same. While some of you might have thought of a pet dog, while some others of a street dog. Even in these two categories, there are millions sub categories. Very rarely will two people take the exact same meaning of a word or set of words.

Here’s an example : He said he sat at the back in the theater.

For all of us, ‘at the back’ would mean towards the rear end, but where exactly is different to each one of us.

Why is it important to be exact, you ask me. The examples I gave are very simple ones, think of a situation where someone says a set of sentences to you. With each word having a different detail to it’s meaning for you both, do you now how much possibility there is of a mis-communication?

We say that the root of all evil is that the people involved are unable to convey exactly what it is that they wish to say. Do you now see how it starts.

But why is it so? It is because we understand each word we hear on the basis of our life experiences. When someone talks of pain, for example, we perceive it in a sense in which we have experienced pain. So even a word as general as pain, is different for us all.

Our life experiences dominate each and everything we hear or say. So, the next time you are saying something to someone, or someone says something to you… be more precise, or ask that person to be more precise. 🙂