Words Unscripted, Emotions Unfiltered: On Improvisation and the Weight of the Present Moment
A Reunion Across Time and Distance
Last week, I received an invitation to attend a social gathering organised by medical students from the University of Khartoum, simultaneous reunions held in multiple cities both within Sudan and abroad. I accepted the invitation to join the gathering in Cairo, hoping to reconnect with friends whom the relentless demands of life had kept at arm's length for far too long. Distance and time have a way of eroding even the strongest bonds, filling the space between us with unfinished conversations and delayed reunions.
The program began with a round of introductions, a format that, in its efficiency, somehow emphasises the passage of years and the erosion of time. I felt it acutely. What followed was a series of diverse and thoughtful segments: thought-provoking questions, poetic exchanges, and the generous hospitality of the hosts. Above all, there was coffee, that universal solace that provided comfort against the sharp edge of winter's chill, warming hands and spirits alike.
An Unexpected Request
The crux of the evening came when I was asked to address the students. The implicit topic was clear: as the eldest among those gathered, I was being called upon to offer words of wisdom and perspective.
Initially, I had resisted even sitting down, preferring instead to remain standing on the ground itself. There is something both humble and honest about remaining connected to the earth; we come from it, and to it we return. But the insistence and generosity of friends proved more compelling. I acquiesced.
Timing is everything. Days before this moment, I had submitted my resignation from my position at the university. That decision carried with it a weight of conflict -not doubt- exactly, but a complexity of emotions that had not yet found their way into the open. Resentment lingered in the shadows. Regret whispered at the margins.
This psychological state became the unwitting architect of everything I would say.
Image: Reunion and Reflection
Medical Students and Graduates of the University of Khartoum Faculty of Medicine reunited in Cairo, Egypt, a moment capturing both joy and the weight of shared history
Speaking Without a Script: The Perils of Improvisation
I stood to speak without prior notice, without preparation, without forethought. There was no script. There had been no time to organise my thoughts or shape my words with intention.
Over recent years, I have developed a technique to maintain composure while speaking publicly: I focus my gaze on inanimate objects or people whose expressions remain neutral, fixed points of stability that allow my thoughts to flow uninterrupted, without stuttering, without silences, without repetition. This anchoring of the eyes allows the voice to find its steady rhythm.
But that evening was different. For long moments, my gaze remained fixed on the ground. When I finally lifted my eyes to meet those of my listeners, I saw something that shook me: their faces bore expressions of concern mingled with pain. What I had believed to be realistic -even necessary- words now appeared to them as something darker. Bleak. Perhaps even hopeless.
In their faces, I saw the unintended impact of my emotional state manifesting in my speech. My psychological burden had travelled through my words directly into theirs.
The Moment of Correction
This realisation demanded a response. I paused and shifted course, offering counsel and encouragement, acknowledging the extraordinary strength and patience that this generation has demonstrated in the face of profound difficulty, a difficulty that extends across the university, across the nation itself, through this tumultuous period in Sudan's history.
In that moment, I recognised that the best course of action was simply to stop. To close the chapter. To say what needed to be said and then yield to silence.
A colleague then rose to offer remarks in response to my words, an effort to inject some measure of hope, to breathe renewed positivity into the hearts and minds of those assembled. Whether his attempt succeeded in creating equilibrium—in balancing the scales between darkness and light, I cannot say with certainty. Perhaps, as the saying goes, the opposite reveals the beauty of its contrast.
Reflections in the Aftermath
The evening concluded, but questions remain. Did the echoes of those improvised words linger in a meaningful way? Did they offer anything of value, or did they evaporate into the Cairo night, leaving only unease in their wake?
What I know with certainty is this: a more thoughtful, a more considered, a more purposeful message would have emerged had I known in advance that I would be called upon to speak. Had I been asked specific, clarifying questions, ones that would have constrained and directed my thoughts, the conversation might have unfolded differently. A prepared mind yields different words than a troubled one speaking extemporaneously.
The Weight of Words Unscripted
This experience has crystallised an important truth about human communication, particularly in moments of leadership or influence:
The speaker's internal state does not merely colour the words; it becomes the very substance of them. Emotions unprocessed, conflicts unresolved, and conflicts that remain unspoken travel through our language into the consciousness of those who hear us. No matter how carefully we choose individual words, the underlying psychological weather will penetrate through to those listening.
This is not an argument against authenticity or against speaking from the heart. Rather, it is a call for intentionality, to understand our emotional landscape before we offer it as instruction to others; to know ourselves sufficiently well that we can distinguish between what needs to be said and what merely needs to be expressed; to recognise the difference between teaching and catharsis.
Beyond Spontaneity
The lesson of that evening -one I am still processing- is multilayered. It suggests that the best speeches, the most transformative conversations, and the most genuine acts of mentorship emerge not from spontaneity alone, but from the marriage of authenticity and preparation; from knowing both our hearts and our minds; from the intentional gap between feeling and expression.
For those of us who teach, who lead, or who step into spaces where our words carry weight: the call is clear. Examine yourself before you speak. Not to suppress what you feel, but to understand it deeply enough that you can choose how to express it, and crucially, when to stop.
The students in Cairo deserved more than my unprocessed emotions delivered in real time. They deserved a speaker who had integrated both the difficulty and the hope, the conflict and the conviction, into something coherent and nurturing.
Perhaps that is the true gift one generation can offer the next: not perfection, but the hard-won wisdom of knowing when to continue and when to close the book.
Comments
Post a Comment