Three times in the past week various acquaintances have referred to my work as “little”. As in, “I like your little thoughts you put online” or “Your little posts are sweet.” Insert invisible eye roll. If they only knew the amount of hours and planning it takes for these “little” thoughts to percolate, bubble to the surface, and fizz out from my fingers, they might see it differently.
Had this occurred a few years ago, I would have eaten their words and washed them down with a healthy side of shame. Because words are my creative expression, my vocation, and one of the greatest loves of my life, the words others speak over me have the power to influence me at a soul level. I’m not saying this is right, only that it’s true.
As March approaches, bringing with it both Lent and my birthday, my thoughts often turn to the spoken word. A few years ago, I gave up yelling at my children for Lent. Strange? Yes, but I felt convicted that yelling as a means of restoring order was a terrible use of my words. They became weapons, very loud weapons, aimed at unsuspecting children who were simply going about the work of being small. I (mostly) broke the habit of yelling, which is an Easter miracle in and off itself.
Words wield power, regardless of volume.
The whispered, internal words are the most potent of all.
Two birthdays ago, I gave myself the gift of kind words. I decided that every year on my birthday, I would only speak kind words to myself. I wouldn’t self-deprecate, or belittle my progress. I wouldn’t bemoan the fine lines like feathers on my face. I wouldn’t tell myself to be better, do better, live better. Birthdays are a Kind Words Only space.
Where I once turned my head back to see what I had or had not accomplished at this age, then the next age, I now spend my birthdays firmly rooted in the present. On this day I am this old. And today, of all days I am loved simply because God slipped my soul into skin and placed me in this world.
I wish I had the willpower to make every day a birthday, every day a non-yelling day, every day a day where I shrug off the unintentional words that make my work feel tangential and small. But I don’t have the willpower, and so I find I need to turn to the source of all words, the Word of God himself to remind me of who I am in Christ–a beloved daughter in whom God delights.
As we move into Easter and Spring, seasons marked by life, life, and more life, it’s a good time to remember that our words have the power to speak life or death. They have the power to carry us forward or keep us looking back. The power to shame or uplift. What better time to remember who we are and why we celebrate? Our lives our worthy of redemption. However small we appear in other’s eyes, we are precious in God’s sight.
“Let the redeemed of the Lord say so…”~Psalm 107:2.
