Come Again?
Once I was talking to a friend of mine.
This guy was Japanese, but pretty fluent in English.
Still, there were some issues with pronunciation.
He lived in Japan, but had spent time in the UK as an exchange student.
We were talking about various types of fast food.
He said one was “rubbish,” which is a British word.
But he pronounced as you’d expect.
The punch line that I couldn’t quite figure out what he meant by the context.
Since my American ears weren’t really tuned for “rubbish” in the context of food.
And since in Japanese, they don’t really have an “r” sound, it sort of sounded like an “l.”
This Can’t Be Right
My best guess was that he said “Lavish.”
They also don’t have a “v” sound.
When they say “r” it sounds like “l”.
When they say “v” it sounds like “b”.
So, my best guess was “lavish.”
And since were talking about fast food place that taste like crap, I said:
“Dude, what?”
To my, “dude what” he said:
“Dude, what?”
I explained what I thought he said.
He explained what he DID say.
Which was a very, very rare event with two people with two different native languages.
A misunderstanding of a word that is the exact OPPOSITE of the intention of the word.
Pervert Brain
Another miscommunication is one I absolutely cannot explain.
Except for the potentially perverted brain of the guy listening to me.
A guy I used to work with.
I was doing something, crunching some numbers on a PC.
He was standing behind me, reading a completely different report.
He asked me what I was doing that weekend.
I mumbled something about doing something normal, maybe going to see a movie.
He said:
“Dude, WHAT??!!”
I said:
Huh?
He said:
What did you just say?
I repeated what I said.
He looked really embarrassed.
I said:
What did you think I said:
He said:
(This is an absolutely true story by the way)
I thought you said:
I’m going to lick my dad’s girlfriend.
I laughed, trying to imagine how in the world he could possibly have thought that.
And he never came up with a believable explanation.
Tragic Or Comic
Normally, when these kind of things happen, they are pretty funny.
Sometimes though, they are disastrous.
Especially when the things we misunderstand are from childhood.
Memories of being yelled at by adults.
From the adults perspective, they’re trying to keep us from running out in traffic.
But from our childhood brain’s perspective, we interpret that, and REMEMBER that as an AUTHORITY saying:
“Don’t go after what looks like fun!”
Luckily, we can remove all that mis-remembered, mis-understood crap that’s keeping us in our comfort zone.
And ENJOY chasing what looks like fun.
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