Same but Different

Have you ever been confused between confused between ‘their’ and ‘there’? Or maybe ‘effect’ and ‘affect’. There are so many things that seem the same but are very different for example, listening and hearing.

Sometime back my mother was telling me something serious, but in the middle of it she got upset and said that I wasn’t listening. I then told her that I could repeat every single word she said, which further irritated her. She said that while I heard what she was saying, I was not paying enough attention to understand what she was saying. I understood her point, but it got me thinking that are their words which are similar but different? Meaning we may think they are same but then when we think harder they are completely different.

So I researched for words that are similar but different, the research was quite interesting ... because I learnt many new things, which were:

Homograph-I learnt that there are words which may be spelt the same but are pronounced differently and have different meanings. Like ...

Lead as in leader vs lead as in metal

Wind as in air vs wind as in wire

Bass in sound vs bass as fish

But this is not what I was looking for! So I continued and found ...

Homophone-These are words that sound the same but may be spelt differently or mean different things. This was really fun as I learned that there was a word for something like this that we so often use but I didn’t know about. These can be ...

Advise - offering suggestions vs Advice - Guiding someone for action

Complement - matching/ supplement vs Compliment - Praising/ say something nice

Censor - banning part of book/ song/ movie etc vs Censure - strong disapproval

There were many more like Cue & Queue, Dual & Duel, Band & Banned, Isle & Aisle, Effect & affect, Die & Dye, Ascent & Assent, Flower & Flour, meter & metre ... we can go on but I must say I had fun researching these, however this was still not what I was looking for so I tried more ...

Homonym ... These are words that are spelt the same but are pronounced differently and mean different things (Homograph), or words that are spelled and pronounced the same way but mean different things. Now this is really tricky so to make it more understandable, let us see some examples ...

Address as in location, or as in to talk to someone

Pitcher as in a pitcher in baseball, and a pitcher as in water (Beer)

Kind as in act nice, or as in type

Again I found many homonyms but once again they are not about listening vs hearing.

I also found many other examples of similar but different words like ... Weather & Climate, Guaranty & Warranty, Infer & Imply, Convince & Persuade but none of them solved my original problem of understanding more about what my mom had said about listening and hearing. I asked my elder brother then and he said these are paradoxes, and he was wrong as usual.

So I went back to the source of the problem and I asked my parents about it . So we did something interesting, we did brainstorming as a family ... here is what we discussed

Hearing vs listening: Hearing is an action of hearing what another person is saying. But listening is understanding what the person is saying. So when you listen, it is necessary to hear as well. So, when you pay enough attention to understand it then you are listening.

Memorising vs Learning: Memorising is looking at information and forcing yourself to remember it, while learning is looking at the information and understanding it, so you remember it.

Intelligence vs Wisdom: Intelligence is ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills but wisdom is to have experience, knowledge and good judgment to use them in the right manner. An intelligent person can prove her or his point, whilst a wise lady/ man knows there is no point. Intelligence is good but wisdom achieves better results.

Friends vs acquaintances: We often refer to anyone we play with as a friend, but often they are just acquaintances. Friends are those who are close to you, you understand and trust them and they do the same to you.

So we agreed there is no single word that explains words, like the ones above, that are similar but different. But we did find out why we had to learn the difference between these words. We talk to someone to understand what they want to say, to do that you need to listen, not hear. We want to learn more to find out what are the right and wrong things to do, and that is wisdom. We interact with people to have a close relationship with them, that close relationship is called friendship.

I learnt from my parents that, we need to know this difference to achieve the purpose or objective of doing what we are doing. It is impoprtant for us kids to know the difference between these things. However, not only kids, but adults need to learn the difference as well, and apply it into their lives. The correct implementation of knowing the difference can give you a head start and help you succeed in life. On the other hand not knowing the difference can prevent you from succeeding.