Volume Speaks Value

Have you heard the expression, "silence speaks volumes?"

I took a non-verbal communication class in undergrad. From the perspective of a guy who loves to talk, majored in public speaking and speech-writing, and became a pastor...this wasn't a class I was particularly thrilled to take. I will say, 20 years later, that it was one of my favorites. Ask me some time just how enamored I was with the theory that tone [actual sound] was considered a non-verbal communicator. I do know and understand [much more thanks to that course] that we actually communicate as much if not more with our non-verbals than our verbals. Plus, I once knew all of the lyrics to the Alison Krauss song, "When You Say Nothing At All."

Volume is a non-verbal, too. What? Volume is actually how you make something verbal. Wait. There's more. For starters, volume isn't just how loud or soft something is. Head on over to geometry for a moment. [Just don't stay too long. People tend to get stuck on math.] Volume is also how much of something there is, i.e. ounces of coffee in my cup this afternoon. We communicate quite a bit with our volume. We communicate value by how loudly we say something and also how often we repeat it.

Folks in my congregational purview have heard me use the illustration more than once. If my son, Simon, is about to chase a ball into a busy road, I don't calmly remark, "Simon, buddy, look both ways." I yell and scream. His safety is too important. He's my son and I love him. I'm not losing my mind over the ball being flattened in oncoming traffic. I'm terrified at the thought, however, of losing him. Volume in that moment indicates an incredible value. It's the life of my child that's at stake and the shrill of my voice each decibel I reach only communicates that fact all the more.

Again, volume isn't just sound. It's frequency [pun neither intended or regretted]. How many times do parents ask their kids to make beds or clean rooms or study history in a given week? month? year? We're always asking, reminding, prodding, pointing our kids toward something and it's usually healthy habits and responsibilities. Keeping in mind that volume speaks value, do we communicate other things [more important things] quite as often? Do I ask my kids about their prayer requests, bible reading, devotional lives, and faith journeys as much as I do their teeth brushing and chore performing habits? Can we inadvertently communicate with our emphasis on spelling words and math problems that straight A's somehow matter more than spiritual growth? Yes. If the volume with which we address those matters completely overshadows that with which we address other things.

I want my life to matter. That is pride I have to keep in check, for sure. Considering every aspect of said life and the limited amount of time and resources I have, I know that the volume [how loud I get and how often I get there] speaks a great deal about what I value most in life. So, the loudest and most frequent things about me...those that come to mind absolutely and definitively need to be about truth, about faith, and about family.

Welcome to whatever words I have. Cover your ears if I get too loud and do expect me to repeat myself and what matters. My volumes will communicate my values.