Words Have Power

Candi is always telling me, "Shasta, slow down.  Give the filter between your brain and your mouth a chance to work properly."  I was never really sure of what she meant until tonight.

Candi has been my human for four year.  Tonight I realized that I had never seen her truly "ticked off".  I've seen her depressed, disheartened, frustrated, happy, silly, angry, playful and thoughtful, but never truly and seriously mad.  She tries very hard to "walk the walk' that she talks, and so very often stops to consider the intent behind someone's words and NOT just the way they phrased it.  That attitude can be frustrating to this TEA Party dog when we're discussing the latest coming out of D.C.  It can also be helpful in keeping things from getting overheated when debating.  

Sometimes while reading posts, comments and various articles on the internet, I want so badly for Candi to just let loose on people.  But...she doesn't.  Instead, she re-reads what she has written and tries to see how it may come across to the other person.  It is one thing to debate, it is quite another to incite anger.  This is something she is constantly preaching to others when talking about debating the issues.

With all that being said, my human is just human.  As a result of her human nature, she isn't perfect and freely admits it.  She can read something and KNOW that the person didn't mean it like it sounded but still get pretty upset.  Normally when that happens, she walks away for a while and then comes back to it when she is in a calmer frame of mind.  Tonight was not a night for walking away and coming back calmer.

She read the comment to me and I could immediately see the problem.  Actually, if the comment had been directed at me, I would have gone over to the person's home to take a chunk out of their bum.  It wasn't a nice comment, and the person honestly didn't mean it to come across the way it did.  That doesn't excuse it, though.  You see, words have power and when you are spitting them out so fast the filter between your brain and your mouth doesn't work, eventually you are going to phrase something very poorly.  You could even lose a good friend because of it.

So, as Candi says to me, slow down people.  Give the filter between your brain and your mouth a chance to work properly.  Try applying that statement to your politics, your relationships and every other aspect of your life.  I think you'll find you keep friends longer and create fewer enemies that way.