Have you ever said something in the heat of the moment and would give anything to take it back? Maybe you said something that happened to be what you were feeling, yet you did not realize the impact that it was going to have on the person on the receiving end. Perhaps you even said it not caring about the consequences, it just happened to be what you were thinking or believed and you just needed to get it out. I would venture to say we have all done this at one time or another.

This past week I was thinking about this particular subject a lot. I was pondering moments where someone said something to me years ago and I could picture them saying it to me as if it were in the present moment. Sometimes hurtful things that never seemed to find their way out of my mind and sometimes things that were encouraging and good advice that I have used throughout life. No matter what the type of message, I would venture to say that the majority of the people who said those things to me had no idea that 20 or 30 years later I still remember the exact words that they said to me as if they were delivered in the current moment.

Our choice of words is especially important when speaking to children. We often do not realize how impressionable they are and how much our words matter. What we say to them could have a more profound impact on how they develop their on self reflection and worth than we even realize. In reality, what we say to adolescents and even adults carries equal importance, as we are in a constant state of mental development as we go through our different stages of our life.

The unfortunate thing is that it is often the negative comments that stay with us the most. They tend to overshadow the positive ones. It is just how our mind operates. When the negative comments outweigh the positive it makes it even more difficult to reconcile those thoughts as we develop our self worth. Getting to the point where we do not care what others think is no easy task, which makes it incumbent on us to think before we speak and consider the consequences that our words may have.

There have been times where my mouth overrode my brain and what came out was not what I had intended. Once said you can not take it back. You can only work to explain what you may have meant. We should always consider that there is a chance that what we say may be something that the person receiving our comments may have to live with for the rest of their life. That makes it important for us to consider if our need to say what is on our mind is worth the impact that it may have. It is as simple as thinking before we speak.

Have a great day and remember to be the reason someone smiles.

Ron

Mornings with Ron is now available as a podcast at anchor.fm/morningswithron or in iHeartRadio, Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify and most podcast sites.