Words

I sit here with the cursor blinking at me like the eyes of a critical judge about to lay down my sentence.

I need to say something. It’s about words.

I love words but they are not always my friend. 99.9% of the time they are. But that .1% is when we really find out the power of words.

A number of times in my life I’ve overheard people talk about me unaware that I heard what they said. Like in a movie. On my two favorite occasions it was guys taking jealously about my date or my style. One time it was a woman commenting on how my optimism looked to her like Peter Pan syndrome, and that was not so fun, but it was informative.

I’m really talking right now about those times people let the polite veneer slip and say something that comes from the core of their being. Often it’s not about you but something they’re projecting.

“You can’t eat convenience store hot dogs all the time,” an overweight friend said to relatively skinny me. He’s dead now, sadly.

“Can you imagine Tim teaching anyone anything?” said another friend. I’d just learned the pleasure of addressing and instructing a roomful.

“You actually believe in superheroes,” said a girlfriend to me of my volunteerism, ignoring the fact that volunteerism is real.

“You’ll never read that whole book,” someone said to me about a large tome I requested as a gift.

Beneath the politeness of life lie these words. I am grateful to know that whether it was hot dog or teach, believe or book, these words revealing deeply rooted sentiments had as much to do with the person speaking as they did me. Still, they can be highly informative.

When I was in the 10th grade, my dad was called in to speak with my Latin teacher, a lady we dismissively referred to as “the Helmet” for her spherical, elder Southern woman coif. To my knowledge it was the only time one of my parents was called in to speak with an educator outside standard parent-teacher conferences. I was on the verge of flunking out of her class and when she presented my dad with the fact he pushed back. “He’s taking Spanish next year so it doesn’t matter,” dad said, both defensive and unaware.

In my life, I’ve always been an inch short of meaningful intervention. It’s a truth that proves to me the underlying narcissism of the universe. Only once has somebody given me truly meaningful respite from this cycle. And that’s a debt I’ll never be able to repay. Indifference is the default position of most people to one another. So, painful as it may be, we need to take heed of people when they let slip their deepest thoughts.

The hot dog comment - it was clearly something he’d heard as a criticism of himself. Nonetheless, it helped me begin to formulate my attitude about junk food.

The teaching comment convicted me even more to how much I’d grown as a person.

The belief comment reinforced for me the importance of my volunteer work but it also gave me a context in which to approach writing for an audience outside mainstream comics.

And lastly the book comment. That was a heavy one. Like, Jacob Marley’s chains heavy… for years. It was delivered at a gut level to my intelligence and commitment. It made be more self-aware on both counts.

Sometimes the people who most support us are only enabling us and the cutting comments we receive from people grant us insight. This is why pleasure and approval seeking are part and parcel to enabling and codependency. The words we use to convey these sentiments are their material form, but they have larger, spiritual implications.

So I thank my critics. Their words are constructive. Sometimes their words are direct repetition of cutting remarks they’ve heard levied against them. In some cases it was obvious to me, in others it took decades for me to make these connections.

Decades ago my #1 Wise Woman reflected that our words and actions are a composite repetition of our observation and experience. Chuck Klosterman never put it better than this dear “soccer mom.” I only wish I’d really understood their depth at the time.

So, let’s shortcut the next step in human (and personal) evolution. With empathy, let’s use our words to give people outside input on themselves. Let’s ask people how they are really feeling in their own words. And let’s use words to construct a better reality.

In terms of words, here, I mean, of course, language. Communication may be a repetition of kindness and not contain a single syllable. Continual kindness may, in fact, be better than any phrase in any language we can muster. But that’s for you to consider.

Words are just tools. Tools can build or they can destroy.

You make the call.