If you can't say somethin' nice, don't say nothin' at all!
This is something that I intend to master before I die for sure! I think it is the worst human frailty that we often speak unkindly of one another. I don't like to do it and it is something that I have worked very hard to avoid, but even so, sometimes I slip and when I do I feel so disappointed in myself.
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Today for instance somebody called me in a bit of a tizzy which made her sound quite tiffy. Well I became quite irritated with Ms. Tiffy Pants which led me to feel quite tiffyish myself. Okay so that's understandable I know, but the problem came when I shared my tiffyish feelings toward Ms. Tiffy Pants with my darling hubby who, after hearing what had transpired, became rather furious (because men don't get tiffyish, they get Mad! Especially when their fair maiden is in distress).
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So now my hubby was fuming about Ms. Tiffy Pants and I began to feel utterly terrible for dragging her name through the mud (so to speak). I hate making other people look bad. It makes me feel like a shmuck.
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Then to make matters worse, another member of our circle called to laugh with me about the behavior of Ms. Tiffy Pants, because it actually was pretty humorous, but because the humor came at Ms. Tiffy Pants' expense it didn't make me feel good about myself at all. Not at all.
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I was humbled, so very humbled as I began to look at the situation from Ms. Tiffy Pants' perspective. As I realized that her heart was in the right place and that it was only stress that had made her freak out, I felt so awful for ever speaking of it to anyone. So I called her and told her thank you for what she had tried to do for me and told her how much I appreciated her and by the end of the conversation I was feeling so warm and fuzzy toward her that I had to call the others involved and sing her praises to them, letting them know that her heart had been in the right place and that I really appreciated her and that they should too, and they said they did, and all was well.
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Then I thought how if I had only stepped back and viewed Ms. Tiffy Pants with compassion in the first place I could have avoided all of the bad feelings of the day. This reminded me of one of my favorite quotes given by Kathleen H. Hughes at the 2006 LDS General Relief Society Meeting, she said:
"Our families (and we could add our friends and acquaintances) need us to speak peace to them, just as the Lord speaks peace to us."
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I love this thought. I can't even tell you how many times the Lord has spoken peace to me and I love the idea of taking my problems to him when I need to "vent" then accepting His peace so that I can speak peace to others.
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So here is yet another thing to add to my list of things I want to master before I die.
1. Let my guard down in public
2. Belt out the hymns at church
3. Only speak peace (be a ray of light in all I do and say).
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And there are plenty of other things too, let me tell ya. I love this life. It is such a glorious time to learn, grow,overcome, and BECOME. I will be better tomorrow than I am today and that makes my heart swell just thinking about it!
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Have you spoken peace today?
4 comments:
Jeanette - This is such a wonderful goal and you have inspired me to work on this myself. You write so beautifully and have a enriching way of sharing your thoughts and feelings with others. I am so glad that I read this today. I do wish that you would get on to the Bramwell-Cooper My Family site so that others can know you and what a talented neat person you are. It really is easy once you log on and would be a blessing to all of us.
So true. I try not to ever speak unkindly of others but sometimes I forget and then I feel horrible. Why do I do that? How great that you had the greatness of heart to put yourself in another's shoes and then took the initiative to call everyone involved back and make it right. Anyone that can count you as a friend is lucky.
Hi, Jeanette, it's cousin Shellie! So thanks to the twins I'm finding out I have a bunch of cousins with blogs. I agree, this is one of the hardest things to master and it's one of my biggest goals. I'm afraid too often I find myself trying to scream peace through the chaos and, well, it's not so peaceful!
I find it hard to think of you having this problem, if so its an itsy bitsy problem, compared to me at least. My hubby though doesnt get as mad as yours. I have more of a Rick temper and Mike has more of a Jeanette temper.
But like you I hate it when it happens. More so when I say something out of frustration to my friends and the next thing I know, my friends are mad for me. This happened in Volleyball once. Someone on my team insulted me, and my friend on the opposing team took it out on the insultee during the game on the court, we lost badly... I guess either way you loose.
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