(Originally posted: March 30, 2026)
When I try to put something into words, I do not feel that I am scooping up the object itself as it is, but rather that I am forming a new likeness of that object. When faced with complex states of mind or sensations with undefined contours, I somehow give a skeletal structure of words to something that cannot be grasped as is. I think this process is closer to a reconstruction through language than it is to a sketch of the subject.
Of course, there is always something that spills out during this process. The moment I give it words, the subtle tremors of emotion or the presence that had not yet been named are, to varying degrees, diminished. That is why it can be said that verbalization is accompanied by a certain kind of loss.
But at the same time, there are contours that only become visible because they have been put into words. This is because things that should have already been there, but which I had not yet been able to grasp myself, sometimes become clearer the moment they are placed as a sentence.
Thinking about it this way, verbalization might not be mere transmission, but rather an activity closer to a form of secondary creation. There is an original sensation, and it is being transferred to another medium called language. The likeness that is created at that time is not completely identical to the prototype. However, that is precisely why it has meaning. As an image reconstructed with different materials rather than a copy, it sheds new light on the original object.
However, I believe a clear ethic is necessary here. Words are a means to understand an object, but they also have the power to fabricate a convenient image. If you adjust what you are feeling too much to suit the convenience of words, something different from the original sensation will emerge in a plausible form.
I think it is important for those who use language to be aware of this danger. Before trusting words, one must fear their power. I see this not as a way to weaken expression, but rather as an attitude to avoid treating sensations carelessly.
The function of words is not limited to that. I have experienced many times the moment when what has been verbalized flows back into me, and that flow refines the contours of the original sensation. By putting it into words, I realize, “So this is how I was feeling.” Or, vague emotions become slightly clearer through the writing. Such a backflow does not damage the original qualia, but rather leads to a result that increases its resolution.
At this time, I think words act not as a device to fix an object, but as a circuit to update sensations. In other words, words and sensations go back and forth, changing their shape little by little. In that sense, verbalization may not be a one-way translation, but an activity closer to co-creation.
In the past, I think I idealized something like a fixed self-completeness, perhaps because I valued the consistency of logic too much. In other words, I may have found comfort in not being too open to the outside and being closed off internally without contradiction.
However, actual language is not that static. Meaning continues to shift and lag.
I believe that Jacques Derrida’s “différance” refers precisely to this state where meaning is not fully determined on the spot, but emerges while being deferred.
I now want to see such gaps not as defects or risks, but as margins for expression. Because they do not match perfectly, other ways of saying things become possible.
Because they cannot be closed off with a single word, they can be retold again and again. I think there is room for thought to grow within that repetition.
If that is the case, words are no longer just objects to be “rightly feared.”
Of course, fear is necessary. However, I want to maintain that fear not to stop my pen, but as a tension to avoid sliding into sloppy conclusions. Only then, I think, can words become a tool that does not fix the object, but gradually changes the relationship with the object itself.
Words create likenesses. Sometimes that likeness reflects back on the original sensation, bringing out contours that were not visible. To continue to weave words while holding the premise that they cannot be fully expressed. And, while accepting that incompleteness and playing with différance, to update sensations. For me, one aspect of verbalization is, I think, such a quiet reciprocating movement.
