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TALKING
THE
TALK
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Before
language
becomes the vehicle for
transformation,
that is to
say
long before
language
is even recognized as the vehicle for
transformation,
and even longer before
transformation
itself is
considered
to be a
possibility,
there's
talking.
There's
talking
about.
There's commenting. There's reporting. There's
opining.
There's
gossiping.
There's
small-talk
and chit-chat. There's
locker room
banter.
There's armchair psychologizing and there's Monday morning
quarterbacking. There's gabbing, blabbing, and yakking.
Before
transformation
enters
front and center
stage
like a
possibility,
before
language
becomes the vehicle for
transformation,
talking
is what people do. There's no inkling (yet) that
talking
(which is to
say
languaging)
is
who people are.
Indeed, that's the
razor thin line
between
"talking"
and
"speaking"
for me: when
languaging
is merely what we do, I distinguish that as
"talking";
when
languaging
is
who we really
are,
I distinguish that as
"speaking".
While that differentation may not be 1,000% watertight, in
this
conversation
it's good enough for jazz.
Prior to
authentic
speaking
emerging like a
possibility,
all verbal expression and
communication
is simply
talking
the
talk.
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TALKING
THE
WALK
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At some
point,
I become aware of the (as yet remote)
possibility
of
transformation.
I
talk
about it. I
talk
about what it might be like. I'm not
living
it. Yet it's almost
present.
It's tangible. I can taste it and, if
the truth
be told, I yearn for it (which is to
say
I yearn for whatever I
consider
it to be). But I'm in a kind of
self-made
trap,
a bind: by
talking
about
transformation,
I effectively preclude myself from
experiencing
transformation
ie from
living
it.
What I don't (yet) know is there's
nothing to figure
out.
I don't (yet) know I'm already
transformed.
I
live
and I
act
in the hope of becoming
transformed
someday
ie I'm
enrolled,
but it's my unwillingness to give up my own
self-imposed
conviction that I'm not yet
transformed,
that
gets
in my
way.
That's
how,
when I
talk
about
transformation,
I inadvertently stick myself in a realm which is
inhospitable to the very onset of
transformation
itself. It's maddening!
So
talking
the
walk
is
being
in a
conversation
about
transformation,
prior to the onset of
living
transformation
itself.
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WALKING
THE
WALK
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"Walking
the
walk"
in colloquial use, designates a high,
authentic
state to be
living
in. In it, I'm
clear
about
being
responsible for (and I am responsible for), about
being
the owner of, indeed about
being
the
creator
of,
my own life.
What's not yet in place (and there's
nothing wrong
with that it's not yet in place) is
language
as the arbiter of
who I am,
of what I
got,
indeed of what's to
come
(when I say it's "not yet in place", I imply it's not yet
empowered).
When I'm
walking
the
walk
and I throw my
hat
over
the wall,
it's my momentum which I put in front of me ... so I have to
get
myself over
the wall
if I want to retrieve my
hat.
It's all in the name of generating the movement for
living
my life
- indeed, that's
the way
I generate the
action
in
my life.
I'm
living
authentically.
But
language
as the arbiter ie as the
source
of my
present
and of my
future,
hasn't yet entered the picture. I'm not yet even aware of the
possibility
of deploying
language
in this
way.
And even if it
begins
dawning on me that I
could
deploy
language
in this
way,
I'm certainly not yet facile with maneuvering and
operating the levers, dials, and pedals and minutiae of
language
itself in this
way
- at least, not yet.
Walking
the
walk
is
authentically
living
and
acting,
grounded in
who I really am
(as distinct from who I think I am, as distinct from who I'd
like to be, even as distinct from who I wound up
being).
While
full
transformation
is now
alive
like a
possibility for the
future,
I'm not yet
living
completely
transformed
in the
present.
I've yet to discover and realize the
possibility
of
language
being
the arbiter of everything I
got,
indeed of everything to come, indeed of everything there
is.
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WALKING
THE
TALK
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As a base, I'm
walking
the
walk.
But now
walking
the
walk
is also the platform for
speaking
my life,
for
living
what I
speak
in the
present,
for
living
from a
created
future
which now exists as a
possibility
because I
speak
it as a
possibility.
When I'm
walking
the
talk
and I throw my
hat
over
the wall,
now it's my
word
which I put in front of me. Now I
live
my life
out of manifesting what I've
spoken
("In the
beginning
was the
word
..."). Rather than merely generating the
action
in
my life
this
way
as I did when
walking
the
walk,
now when I'm
walking
the
talk
I'm also generating
my life
itself.
Walking
the
talk
is
living
transformed
- that is to
say
walking
the
talk
is
authentically
being in action
as a function of my
spoken
and given
word.
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