I recently had a very peculiar thing happen. Another woman sent me a very kind word. I wasn’t expecting it so when it came I was caught off guard. Despite my initial surprise the most amazing thing happened. I felt all light and fuzzy. I felt happy like my whole body was smiling, not just my mouth. I felt encouraged. I felt sure of myself again at a moment when I needed an extra self-esteem boost the most.
As she spoke further kind words I became aware that her sole purpose in the conversation was to offer me encouragement, to lift me up. And more importantly I discovered that she expected nothing in return. She was simply being kind and loving to me because she felt like I needed it.
I tried to tell her of my appreciation, but I don’t think she was able to quite grasp just how much her uplifting words had touched my heart at that exact moment. She succeeded in making me feel good, and who doesn’t need a spirit lift every once and a while.
Later as I thought about her unselfish behavior I was inspired. I was inspired to pass it along, and why shouldn’t I? Why shouldn’t we all? What exactly is keeping women from building up one another?
So often I am witness to the catty, conniving behavior of women. I see just plain ugliness slung at one another and I wince.
How often do you see some ambiguous status update where someone tries to eliminate their anger by shouting it out across social networks, too cowardice to actually confront an individual, but instead preferring to embarrass them on a public forum?
What about spreading rumors about someone without even knowing a single fact, but simply reproducing false information for personal gain, as if cutting someone down will elevate self?
You may say, “I’m standing up for myself! They started it!” That’s fine. So what are you doing now? Are you feeding the flame of discord and propagating anger, or are you offering grace and forgiveness? So maybe you just have to wash your hands of a situation and move on. Isn’t that preferable and more productive than continuing to bash someone to try and make yourself feel better?
Maybe you don’t gossip or call someone out on social media. Maybe you don’t speak unkind words about another out loud or perform actions with the purpose of sabotaging another. If you don’t do those things I’m proud of you. But my question is, what do you speak?
I noticed that it was my personality to not say anything. You might find it hard to believe because of how social I am with my writing, but I’m kind of shy. I would actually consider myself introverted. I found that in social situations I often felt uncomfortable speaking to other women, especially if we were not close or family. Perhaps it had something to do with my past, negative experiences with women as a whole due to situations like I described above. Either way, I realized I wasn’t speaking.
I’m happy to say I wasn’t speaking ugliness, but I discovered I wasn’t speaking anything else either. As I watched my actions I realized that often times I thought compliments for another in my head, but they never made it any further than that. I never spoke them out loud.
As my relationship with The Lord has grown and cultivated it’s become apparent to me how important lifting up other people is to the kingdom of God. And guess what’s encouraging to those around you? Your words. They have the ability to lift someone’s spirits, boost their confidence, and encourage them in a moment when they may truly need that.
Sadly your words can also have the opposite effect. They can cut someone down. They can discourage them, tear at their spirit, and make them feel defeated when they need it the least. The devil loves when he can use us to tear someone down in a moment when they are already weak. Don’t be his pawn.
As I’ve realized this power of words in life I try to use them more and only appropriately. When I see someone I speak. If you know me, saw me out, and I didn’t speak, it wasn’t intentional. It certainly wasn’t because you didn’t speak to me the last time we saw each other! I see this comment from others and I think that’s just silly. Everyone has bad days. Everyone needs to be cut a little slack at times. I hope my friends wouldn’t hold one bad day against me.
Anyway, when I see people, friends or otherwise, I try to smile and speak kindly. I’m also working on letting those compliments out of my head! Have you ever noticed how good it makes you feel when someone notices your new hairdo or recent weight loss? When they acknowledge your hard work, betterment, or just you in general it makes you feel good. I’m not saying people are thirsty for the approval of man and you have to feed that. I’m just saying a kind word or a compliment makes anyone smile. Maybe we should be more free with them.
I’m working on this and I encourage you to join me. Help me to lift people up, not tear them down. Help me to bring a smile to someone else’s face. You never know when they may need it. And for goodness sake, let’s stop being so catty.