Aldous Huxley on the trap of language
“This is the greatest gift which man has ever received or given himself, the gift of language. But we have to remember that although language is absolutely essential to us, it can also be absolutely fatal because we use it wrongly. If we analyze our processes of living, we find that, I imagine, at least 50 percent of our life is spent in the universe of language. We are like icebergs, floating in a sea of immediate experience but projecting into the air of language. Icebergs are about four-fifths under water and one-fifth above. But, I would say, we are considerably more than that above. I should say, we are the best part of 50 percent — and, I suspect, some people are about 80 percent above in the world of language. They virtually never have a direct experience; they live entirely in terms of concepts.”
Full article here.
One Response to “Aldous Huxley on the trap of language”
I think he was the guy who wrote “Brave New World”
We can see what he means
As we’ve often discussed round our kitchen table, we can’t talk, read, or think, our way to enlightenment.
But these three things can offer signposts, or point us in the direction.
But paradoxically, that which reads, talks and thinks, will be absent in awakening or enlightenment.