Watch your tone
INsights 056, Friday 13th September 2024
Watch your tone
INsights 056, Friday 13th September 2024
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Your tone is one of the most critical elements of the way you communicate.
It has a huge role to play in how you get your thoughts and feelings across to others.
It is a prime indicator of what’s really in your head and heart.
Your tone can convey compassion or indifference, seriousness or light-heartedness, joy or sadness, hope or desolation, engagement or boredom, inspiration or discouragement, love or hate, calmness or anger.
God be praised for the miraculous range of possibilities that can emanate from our mouths!
This INsights mini-series on how we as believers use language effectively as a means of connecting to our Lord, as well as conveying the message of monotheism to fellow human beings, simply wouldn’t be complete without covering the topic of tone.
I know it seems like a niche matter. But I believe it has wide-ranging implications.
In this edition, I want to help you reflect on your tone of voice when you communicate with your Lord directly and also when you refer to Him in the third person.
This subject is pretty high on my list of topics that I believe to be of huge importance and which are also typically unaddressed. My nature is such that those are just the issues I like to talk about.
It’s often the simple ideas which are hidden in plain sight that lend themselves to the most profound realisations.
The way you talk to your Lord
When you’re talking to your Lord or referring to Him, do you regularly think about the quality of your communication? About how you’re coming across? About your tone?
If we want Him to take us seriously, we have to take Him seriously, which we demonstrate in large part by the way in which we talk to Him.
Taking salat as an example, when you say the various words and phrases during your prayer, do they convey engagement and connection?
Or do they indicate boredom and disconnection?
If you’re wondering how you’d even know, then it’s worth thinking about whether your voice, even if you’re whispering, is unduly monotonous.
Monotony indicates disinterest. If your tone is flat, it suggests you don’t really mean what you’re saying and perhaps that you’d rather be doing something else.
On the other hand, varying your tone and coming across as impassioned would be natural to you when you really mean what you’re saying and if you are conscious of the context in which you’re saying it.
Let’s be honest with ourselves. Isn’t it the case that we often communicate to our Lord in a way that is rushed and robotic?
It’s incredible to think that the common phrases in prayer are said billions of times a day around the world.
But it’s more mind-blowing to realise that there are also billions of levels of quality with which the phrases can be said. Your tone is a great indicator of your particular level.
Example: I might say “iyyaka na’budu wa iyyaka nasta’in” and God might not take any notice of me because even though the words are so powerful, the way I said them was so lame.
Perhaps I just mumbled them quickly, with no variation in pitch, rhythm or inflection that might indicate any presence of feeling. In my case, the words were made as flat and lifeless as a burnt pancake!
On the other hand, you might say the same words, but in your case you really felt the devotion and really felt your need for His help. As a result, God might elevate you to higher ranks and confer special blessings on you, simply by virtue of how much you meant what you said.
As is the case in so many aspects of life, it’s not just what you say.
It’s how you say it.
The way you talk about your Lord
What about when we sit after the prayer and say various phrases such as subhanallah, alhamdulillah and Allahu akbar?
So many people just rattle these sublime statements off their tongues in a way that could almost be considered disrespectful, possibly without even really thinking about their Lord as they say the words.
We’ve become obsessed by numbers and formulas for reward when it comes to these statements, forgetting the value of wholehearted expressions of true devotion.
What about when we express invocations such as the one that is commonly said when we get into any vehicle at the start of a journey?
Subhanalladhi sakkhara lana hadha wa ma kunna lahu muqrinin, wa inna ila rabbina la munqalibun. (43:13-14)
Notably, our Lord tells us just before these words that this is a way “for you to remember your Lord’s grace when you are seated on them” but if we say the words without reminding ourselves of their meaning, without pausing to consider the wonders of the particular vehicle in which we are travelling, haven’t we missed the point?
Doesn’t it just become a meaningless mantra?
In the end, it comes down to our level of God-consciousness, being alive and present to the divinely governed reality in which we’re operating.
“True believers are those whose hearts tremble when God is mentioned…” (8:2)
So what about when we ourselves are doing the mentioning?
A dynamic relationship with your Lord would naturally prevent you from talking to Him in a way that is disengaged, habitual or formulaic.
You’re not a machine.
You’re a human being.
Express yourself like one.
Especially to the One, and about the One, who gave you the spectacular blessing of being able to make sounds and communicate your thoughts, feelings and ideas.
Praise be to Him for all eternity.
A practical solution
If you’re thinking that this is all very well but what makes it hard to express yourself meaningfully is the fact that all the examples above consist of Arabic words and phrases… well exactly!
Now you might understand even more why I keep going on about not insisting on using Arabic when it isn’t necessary and recommend that you use the language that you know best.
Speaking in other than Arabic in salat itself is a somewhat complex and controversial subject, one that I hope to address comprehensively another time. In the meantime, you have Transform My Prayer to help you deal with prayer related matters.
But elsewhere, you should engage in your dhikr in a way that’s going to make for truly meaningful engagement.
A balanced approach would be to accompany your Arabic phrases with saying the English translations too.
An example would be that when you next get into your car or a bus or a train, you don’t just say the words cited above but you also say, “How perfect is He who has given us control over this; we could not have done it by ourselves; truly it is to our Lord that we are returning.”
This Arabic-and-English practice is particularly essential for our children in order to prevent them from becoming as robotic in remembering God as many of us have sadly become as adults.
Even when you say oft-repeated phrases, you can take care to pause and think momentarily about their meanings, and even say the translation too:
SubhanAllah – God is perfect
Alhamdulillah – Praise belongs to God
La ilaha illallah – There is no god but God
Allahu akbar – God is the greatest
As I’ve acknowledged in previous editions on the topic of language, such measures can feel strange at first, but they are necessary to avoid the even stranger and possibly harmful outcome of empty expression.
Do take the time to examine the quality of your expressions to your Lord and about your Lord.
Consider what your tone suggests about how much He means to you.
Adapt and improve accordingly.
May the way you and I communicate with Him be filled with passion, meaning, love and devotion.
Until next time.
Peace.
Iqbal
~~~
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