Words are Powerful - Dona Nobis Pacem

Words are powerful...

Words hold the power to heal or to hurt.


Words can unite or divide.


Yet, how often do we say words without considering their impact?


Denying the words said doesn't erase them. Taking them back doesn't undo their damage.


I can remember so many times when words cut me to my core, words that the speaker probably doesn't even remember saying yet they stuck in the recesses of my heart and mind and spill out when I'm feeling particularly vulnerable either as a way to erode my self-esteem when I feel confident or to feed whatever insecurity has risen to my thoughts.


When we spew words of hate, hate spreads. When we spew words of violence, violence spreads. When we spew words of chaos, chaos spreads. When we spew words of cruelty, cruelty spreads. When we spew words of divisiveness, divisiveness spreads.


So it would stand to reason, that words of love spread love. Words of peace spread peace. Words of encouragement spread encouragement. Words of compassion spread compassion. Words of unity spread unity.

We cannot speak hate and expect love to grow. We cannot encourage divisiveness and expect acceptance. We cannot glorify violence and expect kindness. We cannot whip up chaos and expect peace.

Peace never comes from war. It always come from the communication that brings two sides to common ground.

We are seduced by the fear and doubt woven into our lives by words spoken with authority until the day we recognize the seduction is meant to divide us, so we can't unite to find a real, lasting peace.

I am not afraid of you or you or you. I am not afraid to love. I am not afraid of uncertainty. I am not afraid of compassion. I am not afraid of walking away from doubt. I am not afraid of accepting my fellow Earthlings as they are. I refuse to be made afraid of beings who share this world with me.

I want to know your stories. I want to know your lives. I want to find our commonalities and our differences. I want to know you.

We all have choices of how we use our words. We are responsible for the words we say.

So we have the choice every time we open our mouths to speak. We can choose to spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt. We can choose to spread love, acceptance, and unity. We have these choices. One leads to chaos and the other leads to peace.

I don't know about you, but I want my words to lead to peace even if we must travel through the chaos of fear, uncertainty, and doubt to find it. 

I am not afraid of the unknown. I am not afraid...

I have traveled to many places in the world and I've seen how much people have in common. My life is filled with people from myriad places in the world who work hard to break through the walls they encounter to be accepted and loved for who they are. I will stand beside those people today, tomorrow, and for eternity because they are the ones who truly seek a world where love conquers hate and peace outshines chaos.

Words have the power to help us see and understand one another just a little bit better if that's what we choose. But, we have to make the choice.

When we are mindful of our words in both intention and consequences, we have the power to use words to create a world in which peace is more celebrated and embraced and cheered than chaos is.


I choose peaceful words as I have tried to do in previous posts on peace. Care to join me, my friend?




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