Not only did I secretively shred zucchini into dishes I cooked for my husband and three sons I also tried to infuse wisdom into our dinner conversations. Our kitchen table overheard our most daring thoughts, our craziest dreams, and our silliest notions. Never judging or squashing even our most outlandish ideas, our words were free to run wild, creating some lively discussions.
I remember a specific dialog we had about how powerful our words were. I explained my philosophy. Words attract like magnets. When we put out positive words to the universe, we get back positivity. When we put out negative words, we get back negativity. I could see the wheels churning in my sons’ precocious brains. They asked if throwing out words to the universe was like slinging cooked spaghetti at the refrigerator. “Exactly I said. Words stick, so choose them wisely.”
The next morning, I flew around the house cooking breakfast, packing lunches, and assembling backpacks, attempting to get everyone out the door on time. I yelled up the stairs, “Hurry, you are going to miss the bus!” My five-year-old son shrieked, “Mom why in the world would you put that out there?”
Not only did my sons understand the point I had tried to make the night before, they had already applied it. While I crawled through a pile of self-doubt, they harnessed the energy of words to create what they wanted. They recognized that thoughts and words set things in motion. Using their words as affirmations, they made the bus and went on to accomplish things beyond their mother’s wildest imagination because they believed they could.
I made a conscious choice not to hand down limiting words to my children, knowing my words would become their inner voice. Words declare who we are and how we perceive the world to be. Depending on how we wield them, words can be used as fine instruments to build ourselves and others up or blunt weapons to tear us apart. Words can be as soothing as healing balm or as hurtful as a punch in the gut. Words can empower us to find our voice or shame us into silence. Words can take our hand and lead us to sunny possibilities or drag us down dark alleys of fear. Words can be used as contemptuous modifiers, poisoning a room with hatred or upbeat adjectives that light it up with joy.
If you want to know someone, listen to their words. Do their words plant seeds of love and kindness or do their words shoot snarky bullets? It’s easy to spit out words of criticism, cynicism, and condemnation. It takes maturity, discipline and leadership to speak words that affirm, empower and inspire.
Words spill out and reveal generational beliefs and ignorance’s. Consciously choosing our words is the quickest way to shift the energy of negativity into something positive and uplifting. If you want to change your life, change your words. Words have the power to change our families, our culture, our communities, and our future.