The Politeness Progressive Conjugation and the Language of Meditation

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Laura Davison. I am calling from San Jose, California.

Hi, Laura. Welcome to the show.

Thank you. It’s great to talk to you guys.

So I’m calling today to talk with you about the language used in guided meditation.

I started meditating a little bit over a year ago, and one of the things that I noticed using the app that I have, there are a lot of teachers on the app who use a certain way of speaking in the guided meditations.

And to me, it was a little bit distracting at first because I had never heard anything like that.

Instead of giving instructions by saying something like sit comfortably or take a deep breath, they would say things like sitting comfortably or breathing deeply.

Mostly, I’m just wondering about like, what is this way of speaking?

Like, what is the style of voice that they use?

And is this more about sharing the experience rather than dictating or describing it?

Because I was in a virtual seminar a few weeks ago where the instructor essentially led us through a guided meditation and then asked us to share about it afterwards.

And he kept stopping people that were trying to share and saying, you’re telling a story or you’re not really putting us in the experience.

So my question is, is that the goal of this guided meditation?

Is it to help people be more present in the experience?

And what is this title of speaking called?

Oh, what an interesting question.

And I’ve noticed that as well, both in the meditation apps and in live in a group full of people in a room with doing meditation.

I’ve absolutely noticed that there is a there’s even a tone to the voice, not just the verb choices and the way they conjugate, but just a feeling to the to the way that they’re talking.

And they don’t talk like that outside of the class.

Right. Right.

And I’m already eager to hear from other people who do this kind of thing.

But, I mean, grammatically what you’re talking about is the use of the present participle, right?

Sitting on the floor, breathing this way.

And, I mean, even as I’m talking about this, I find myself talking in a different way.

And I think you’re onto something there.

I think it’s a way of suggesting something that’s very continuous.

Yeah.

Well, you know.

There’s a name for it.

It’s called the politeness progressive.

Oh, the politeness progressive.

Okay.

Yeah, so it is the progressive form of the verb.

It’s an ongoing action, progressive.

And so, and the politeness part is it lets the speaker distance themselves from a request or a command.

Because they are giving you a command.

Oh, sure.

Yeah, yeah, right.

Because if they said, take a posture or take a seat or move over there, that’s too abrupt.

That’s too forceful in this kind of gentle, caring, subtle environment, right?

Yeah, I mean, there’s a reason that they call this a guided meditation instead of a to-do list or operating instructions or something.

I think it’s a matter of inviting you to an experience and leaving room for your own interpretation.

Because as I gather, in yoga, they’re trying to let you find the pose and position that works for you with your body because people have different abilities.

And isn’t there a lot of talk in meditation about spaciousness, you know, that space between you and your thoughts or between you and the words you’re taking in or between you and your body?

And they’re actually, I think, creating that kind of spaciousness with their choice of words.

I’m also thinking of, you know, hypnotists.

The old image of a hypnotist is somebody saying, you are feeling sleepy.

But I think more and more people who practice hypnosis are using phrases like, and perhaps as you sit there listening to the sound of my voice, you might begin to notice a pleasant sensation of drowsiness.

That’s the lilt. That’s the way they do it. That’s funny.

Not that I’ve ever done hypnosis of that kind, but I’ve seen the YouTube videos.

They definitely use that in meditation as well, for sure.

Yeah.

So when you’re on these apps, do they take it too far, Laura?

Do you have to switch to a different meditation leader sometimes because you just can’t take it anymore?

How does that work for you?

Most of them, they don’t talk a lot during the meditations.

So it’s not so distracting that I feel the need to switch to a different meditation.

And it’s not all of them that do it.

And I was actually kind of trying to look back through some of them to see if I could find one as an example, and I couldn’t.

So it must only be, you know, few and far between where they actually use them.

But it definitely just struck me and it took me a long, it took me almost a year to try to really figure out like, what are they trying to do?

Like, why are they speaking like this?

Thinking about it in a sense of, yes, they’re getting you in the moment and in the experience rather than thinking about it.

You’re actually in it.

It makes a little bit more sense, but I had no idea what it was called.

So that’s really cool.

If you want more on this, if you want to get really super languagey and nerdy, Google politeness, discourse, linguistics, those three words.

And you’ll come up with a ton of stuff that talks about all these subtle ways that we allow people to understand that we are being polite in our language.

We give them out.

We indicate that we’re not being forceful.

We indicate that we’re hedging a little bit.

But politeness, politeness, discourse, linguistics, those three words together should get you a ton of stuff.

Okay, great.

I definitely will.

Thank you.

Laura, thank you so much for calling.

I’m sure everybody’s going to be paying more attention the next time they’re meditating or taking a yoga class.

And good luck with your practice, all right?

Yes, thank you.

And thank you for taking my call.

It’s a pleasure to speak with you guys.

Great speaking with you, too.

Be well.

Bye-bye.

You, too.

Bye-bye.

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