languages brains bodies

A friend and I were reminiscing yesterday about our multiple brains and personalities. Not in the psychological sense but the linguistic. 

She recently returned to another country, and I could see increased comfort with herself and her world because of it. A part of her that had been put on hold had come out of hiding.

Something happens to our selves when we are immersed in another language and culture, individual to each person in a particular geography, dialect, season, learning style and context, foods and people encountered....

I don't notice the minimizing of myself until I am back in a place, in memory or in reality, where I learned another world. Then I get the itch to add as many as possible. How many versions of myself can there be? As many as places I go and people I meet.

Those languages and worlds are not limited to nations. Maybe nations - and also neighborhoods, causes, people groups, homes & families, activities, cities, sub-cultures upon sub-cultures, domain kingdom phylum class order family genus species.

Which languages do I want to learn, now located in one place? What worldviews do they bring? Who do I want to learn them from? Who will I become?

In this year I want to be awake to the place my body is, to hear - at least recognize - the languages and mindsets of those I am with. This helps my feet stay in one place.