A common saying goes, “sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me”.
I disagree with this idiom. Words do touch our minds and souls in a powerful way, more powerful than the sticks and stones that break the bones. Just like if you break a bone you can never un-break it, when you say something to someone, whether it was positive or negative, you can never take it back. How the person takes what you have said can have a long impact on their lives and you would not even know it.
Words do change people’s live positively. Many times when I feel like I need inspiration or motivation, I simply just go on YouTube and watch a motivational video or read a motivational article. It does wonders to me, especially if I can relate to what the speaker or the author is trying to bring across. Just by hearing inspiring words, it can make me fired up to carry out a certain task that I am supposed to carry out. Sometime I am feeling down, I read some calming words and materials written on having faith and hope. I am sure it is the same with you too. Sometimes all you need is words to change your mood, day and life.
Just as positive words can change our entire day and life, so are negative words. Negative words break a soul much worse that the stick and stones that break the soul. When something mean or negative is said to us, we get hurt more even if it was not physical. People that are verbally abused are just as damaged as these that are physically abused and there is no justification for such behaviour. When someone is being called bad names or insulted, it affects their self-worth and drops their self-esteem. For some, this emotional trauma starts affecting other parts of their live such as their relationships with other people. They start hiding away from people, abusing drugs and alcohol to feel better, giving in to peer pressure to feel like they belong and many other toxic behaviour. Some become bullies themselves to feel like they also have some sort of power and just as simple like that, then bullying circle gets bigger and bigger.
We must learn to have filter in our words sometimes. If you are going to use your words, use them to affect others positively and not negatively, unless of course unintentionally. Watch what comes out of your mouth and say what is appropriate to the right people or audience. Use your words to give hope, to help these that need information from you, to nurture the young ones into bright adults and many other positive things you can do. Words may never break bones but they break the heart, the mind, the soul and humanity at large. Once you have said something, you apologise but you can never un-say it. Whether the other person takes the apology or not is not in your power anymore.