Human emotion, time and the power of language

As the world we live in has developed, it's no cursed secret that language and emotions come together in a package deal. Therapy, ranting, word vomit, and rage diaries are emotional outlets that we’re all familiar with (some I gravitate to more than others), and they all require a personal connection to language.

In definition, therapy is the process of treatment for mental conditions through verbal communication. Ergo, language and emotions are intertwined. Talking about how I feel in the form of ranting or word vomit is perhaps my go-to outlet; it might never make sense to the person receiving it, but it’s the process that is most beneficial. After reflecting on the times I’ve done this, I identified that what troubles me most is dealing with time. An overwhelming feeling of not having enough time, of wasting whatever time I do have, panicking about how to save time or if people or things are worth my time.

It’s this that pushed me to write this post. Struggling to deal with the emotional concept of time comes from language. Specifically, the English Language. This could be considered as ‘intellectualising my emotions’, but I enjoy the comfort of language and its impact on our existence as humans.

As far as the English Language is concerned, time is money. The deep emotional panics we all experience are over a tangible object that truly exists. Our feeling of overwhelm during exam season, the anger or frustration we feel when a parcel is delayed or an event is rescheduled, is because we feel like it has literally “cost” us time, just based on the nature of the language's structure. ‘English-speaking culture’ is so arranged, scheduled, and managed that it has an effect on how we feel. It's common for people to bottle their emotions up, depending on how much time they have to let go, or their emotions are often based on the time we do or do not have. In fact, this linguistic phenomenon and emotional state are prominent in places with an ‘English-speaking culture’, meaning those places that are not England but have the same culture.

Hawai'i has previously been regarded as the least stressful state; how and why? And what does language have to do with this?

Unlike English, the Hawaiian language is based on a different concept; time is treated as a fluid and flexible concept that relates more to the natural rhythm of the world than schedules. Commonly, in Hawaiian culture, time can be distinguished in two ways: haole and Hawaiian time. Haole time is that used by foreigners, referring to exact times: 7:00 pm haole means 7:00 pm exactly. However, the same thing referred to as Hawaiian time means whenever you get there, you get there, and it’s fine.

Thinking about human emotion and what really makes us feel, it seems that we would be much better off, more free, and a little more emotionally honest if the language we spoke better reflected time.