Sound of Silence

Just happens to be the song I was just playing. Kind of fit as the title of this blog, so I'll leave it as is.

I am bad at talking.
Growing up, I had a stutter. While I've grown out of that, my brain still processes words faster than I can say them, making it hard for me to talk a lot. Also, my brain likes to completely drop important words from my vocabulary whenever I need them most. This makes things like acting, giving speeches, and praying out loud really difficult for me.

But that's not really what this is about.

I was never really a quite person. I know when I was growing up, when my mom would pick us up from school, my sister would talk non stop for the whole car ride, saying how her day was, what her friends were up to, etc. She could talk for days. I distinctly remember one day I wanted to tell my mom how my day went, but I couldn't because words didn't flow the same was. I ended up saying like one sentence and my mom was like,"Oh, really?" It wasn't that big of a deal, but I just remember that as the first time I realized that communicating was hard for me.

This "disability" that I had helped me to develop a lying compulsion. I would lie about EVERYTHING just so that I would have something to talk about. I would make up friends so that I would seem cooler. I would tell stories about all the cool things we did together. I would make up facts about my life. I would make up stories about things with boys. I was pretty good at it. I'm still good at it. Well, I'm a TERRIBLE liar when it comes to white lies or something that isn't serious. But, I'm pretty sure I could convince you of something that is completely untrue. I still do it from time to time to try and come up with things to talk about.

However, lying is bad and eventually my conscience kicked in. I stopped lying about things so that I could start conversations with people. Instead, I would just be quiet. I would sit back in listen, waiting for someone to say something about me so that I could be part of the conversation. I always felt like this turned people off, made people think I was upset or weird or something. It definitely made me really boring because I never had anything to talk about. When I finally did find something to talk about, it was always just me rambling on about myself, and no one wants to hear that.

PRO side of this: I have become a person that people confide in. People know they can tell me things. I'm a really good listener.
CON side: I never had the right words to say in response.

This was so hard for me. I would pray all the time for God to give me words. I want to be able to have conversations with people. I think that's a big reason why it's so hard for me to keep friends. They lose interest in me because I never have anything to talk about. And it's not because I'm shy! I'm the same way around people I am comfortable with. The worst part of all of this is that I HATE small talk. It makes me was to punch you, but I don't know what to do.

Today, this missionary guy came to my church and performed. I really liked his songs and I really liked what he was doing. I spent the entire hour that he was performing thinking of something to say to him afterwards because I wanted to know more about him. I couldn't think of anything. Not one thing. I just stood there next to him, buying merch. He just so happened to asked me stuff like where I went to school and what I was studying, but I left like I was boring him. It was awful. This kind of thing happens all the time. It makes me just want to stand back and not say anything.

I want to be a teacher "when I grow up." I've had so many teachers, especially my middle school band director, who have helped me over the years. How am I supposed to affect any of the students lives if I can't even have a conversation with them? I have so much advice. I've been there, done that, but I can't put those experiences into words.

Lord, give words to speak.

It's what's holding me back from being the best I can be.