Lost for words

"Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with deeper meaning."

— Maya Angelou

When did you last stop to ask a stranger for directions? Exchange a few words with the person at the checkout? Chat with the neighbour through the garden fence?

Some things change, quietly, invisibly, without us even noticing.

A recent study suggests we are "Sliding Into Silence". We are using around 338 spoken words less (roughly the length of this article) every single day, every year, for at lea [2]t the last 15 years.[1] That's over 120,000 words a year. It is both fascinating and sobering that nearly a quarter of our daily voice is lost. Gone!

Where did the words go? Did they vanish into thin air?

They slipped away through the tiny moments woven into everyday life. A silent scroll instead of a chat at the bus stop, an app order instead of a ‘good morning’ to the barista, a GPS rerouting us away from the chance to ask a local, a nod at the self-checkout ...
(Personal note regarding the check-out: A lot of them are automated now and I will confess having had a few too many colourful words with the self-checkout when ‘it’ kept repeating to me "Unexpected item in bagging area" … You know the feeling?!)

The participants of the research ranged from age 10 to 94 so no age group was spared. As if that was not astonishing enough, the data stops in 2019, before a global pandemic quietly reshaped our habits and connections.

I have coined an evocative word for it (or perhaps two): Wordloss - The quiet disappearing of the spoken word from our days, our relationships and even sometimes, right from the middle of our own sentences making us Wordlonely.

You might argue that we are writing more than ever (anyone here belong to a WhatsApp group? 😬). You will not be surprised to learn the study points out that typed words lack the "presence, tone and spontaneity" of a real exchange. Our vocal cords are like muscles and as with any muscle we “use it or lose it”!

But what really speaks to me, is that spoken words carry something that typed words simply cannot convey.

Presence. Warmth. Intonation. Accent. Variation.

The pause, the slip of the tongue, the stumble before you find the right thing to say. That is where our humanity lives.

When we stop talking to the neighbour in the hallway or the stranger at the bus stop, we lose those micro-connections that anchor us, not just to our community, but also to ourselves.

. . . . .

This month, I invite you to experiment with your words:

. . . . .

✔️ Say something out loud that you might have otherwise typed, scrolled past or kept to yourself

✔️ Initiate small talk

✔️ Ask a question

✔️ Offer a compliment or simply acknowledge the person in front of you

✔️ Just let someone hear your voice (that ‘someone’ can be your pet too!)

. . . . .

Now, here is where it gets a bit more personal and perhaps familiar.

If you are navigating peri/menopause, you may have noticed your words going missing. Mid-sentence. They are right there, on the tip of your tongue and then … nothing. You reach for a name, a word, a thought you had just a moment ago … and it has simply, awkwardly, frustratingly, dissolved.

You are not MAD [2], nor losing your mind. You are in the middle of one of the most significant neurological reorganisations of your life!

Did you know that fluctuating oestrogen directly affects the brain's memory and language centres?

Particularly the very regions involved in word retrieval and verbal fluency. What feels like an embarrassing ‘blank’ is actually your brain adapting, rewiring, recalibrating. This is not a decline, it is a transition. The fog will lift. The words come back and you will find a more purposeful way of expressing yourself on “the other side”.

In the meantime, I agree that in the thick of it, it feels profoundly disorientating. The world is very noisy and, on the other hand, quieter than it used to be, offering fewer of those small, spontaneous exchanges that remind us we are seen and heard.

You get to change that by playing with the suggested tiny experiments this month and dare to be the change you want to see in your organisation, family, community and life!

[1] Source: Pfeifer, V. A. & Mehl, M. R. (2026). Sliding Into Silence? - We Are Speaking 300 Daily Words Fewer Every Year. Perspectives on Psychological Science. DOI: 10.1177/17456916261425131

[2]In 2024, I wrote a blog reframing what it means to be MAD... find out about Mastering Adaptable Determination and Making A Difference.

Image Credit: Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash