Just show up!

Insights into bilinguality and vulnerability

It took me a while to write this letter. You’ll understand why.

Sometimes, misunderstandings arise in the simplest interactions. In a question about what to have for lunch between us and our mother, or in the text we send to a friend because we forgot their birthday. Things can go wrong all the time when we say things. Now, can you imagine what a blank page and a congregation of people you haven’t met yet can do to the mind of someone who wants to share something? It took me plenty of time to start writing this. Plenty of time. But I guess you know that feeling, right? I know you do because you’re becoming bilingual.

Words and vulnerability

You see, very few things in life can be more challenging than words. Words are like open doors and open gates — they’re like saying “come right in! take a look around my heart”. This can be really difficult for some of us. What if something gets broken? What if nobody understands me? We’re so vulnerable when we open our mouths. So exposed. Sometimes there might be something killing us inside, and yet we won’t get to that door. We won’t open it. Sometimes it just feels safer to stay inside, to hide right in the middle of our comfort zone and remain there alone, where nothing can be damaged and no-one can judge us. It took me ages to say “I’m bilingual”. It took me ages to admit it to myself and to others that it doesn’t really matter how well I spoke my second language. What really matters is that I want to share life with others in English. What matters is that I showed up and I was willing to connect, wholeheartedly. Yet, for a long time, it felt as though if I said the words “I am bilingual”, I would be open to scrutiny. I could be falsified. What if I was not bilingual? I couldn’t take the risk.

There’s something about the moment we open up our mouths that reveals us like on an X-Ray. Our choices become visible. They can be taken, analysed and acted upon. They can be liked, disliked or completely ignored. One moment we’re safe in a cocoon of possibilities. The next we’re staring at the face of the uncontrollable. Whatever we said and however we said it is out in the universe now. We can’t take it back. What did it say about me? Did I make fool of myself? There are people that spend their whole lives saying as little as they can and sharing as little as they can with the world. This is already true in our first language and it’s even more present in our second language. When we express ourselves in a language that was not there when we were born, things can get even more frightening. They can get shit scary!

From hero to zero in a few words

Once I was helping this lady to answer a question about how she was feeling. She had hired me to give her some advice on becoming bilingual. We had been chatting in Portuguese since we started the conversation at a lovely café in Porto Alegre. It was all going very well until I switched languages. I like doing that as part of a lifestyle, so in a moment of pause I asked her: “how are you feeling, ma’am?”. She froze. Her hands clasped the cushioned seat of the sofa underneath her. She looked around as though as she was checking to see if one else was listening, and swallowed out loud before she said: “I’m good”. Her voice was faint like she almost didn’t want to be heard. If you had been there, you would have seen what I’m talking about. I had a whole other person sitting in front of me now. The bubbly personality, the confidence and the sparkle in the eye were completely gone. It felt like the lazy afternoon chat we were having had suddenly turned into a presidential debate. In a matter of seconds, it was all about words, about correctness and literal meanings. It was all about discipline and posture. It was definitely not about human beings any longer. Her body was still there, but her mind had taken complete control over every single breath she was taking. Her eyes were sharp. Her mouth was tightly closed. She looked as though she was ready for a fight, ready for me to throw the next spiky question at her. I didn’t. I didn’t feed into that that negative emotion. I just stayed there in silence, giving her some room, letting the ice melt. It did. After a couple of minutes she asked me how I was doing and the conversation went on a lot better. Perhaps she understood I was there waiting for her to come back. Perhaps that’s all it takes us: some time relax. But this kind of situation happens all too often. We start a conversation with someone in English, we knock on the door, and although the door opens, there’s no-one there. We don’t feel like a visitor anymore. We feel uninvited like a quality inspector — almost as if we were there just to judge the owner of the place, to “put them back on track”. But how more on track can we be when we’re already giving our best just by being there?

Just show up

At the end of the day, we were the ones who decided to express ourselves through the sounds of other cultures. We were the ones who decided to become bilingual. Nobody did it for us. We all know this not always an easy journey. It takes a lot of courage to say the simplest things even in our first language. But, we’ve showed up. We were willing to open the doors for other people to come in so we can connect. We were willing to share life in the friction of two languages, in the contrast of two universes. Of course things can get broken. People might not like our carpet or complain about the toilet flush. It’s not like we’re saying our house is perfect — far from it. Perfection is out of question here. What is at question is our ability to accept ourselves and to be the for others with all our heart. Truth is, we’re opening our house so we can sit down and have a cup of tea and a biscuit together. We’re fetching that door in our second language because we can laugh together about the broken toilet flush and maybe even come up with solutions for it in cooperation. We’re opening our house to be seen as human beings, imperfect. We’re there at the door to let the light in, so we can be ourselves. It might take us some time to build up the courage to do that, I know. It took me plenty of time to say I’m bilingual. It took me ages to gather the strength write this letter and to accept that misunderstandings are all but inevitable.

But, hey! I’m here. Just come on in!

Care for a cup of tea?

Drix Silva

Cognitive Linguist |English Therapist