I used to think so too but I once did a little thought experiment, and while it seems to be true that language influences our thought patterns, I'm not sure if

I used to think so too but I once did a little thought experiment, and while it seems to be true that language influences our thought patterns, I'm not sure if it necessarily limits them. Empirically, we are able to think thoughts and feel things that we cannot describe in words. I know I'm able to feel ennui, limerence, or hygge without knowing these words. I can also perceive things and states without necessarily being able to describe them precisely with single words (but I could probably describe them approximately with many words) The classic example is that the Inuit have many words for different types of snow -- implicit in this example is that they are able to recognize different types of snow and have codified them into shared symbols (words). But to me, that doesn't mean the rest of us who don't have those words cannot perceive the same if we'd lived in the same environment. Children can tell packing snow from sleet from a dusting even without knowing the words. There's an industry of people romanticizing certain words in a foreign culture, claiming them to be untranslatable, and then writing books/articles about them. Not all of this is without merit, but I believe that the words themselves aren't so much untranslatable, but that they have no compact representation outside of a certain cultural context. Words are compressions of meaning, but meaning can be perceived outside of verbal representation, or even language. It seems to me one can look at a picture or taste a meal or listen to instrumental music and perceive and manipulate meaning through no use of language at all.