Language most Foul

I had a terrible experience with this one today.  I had a customer come in and call me so many horrible names that it was just, well, insulting, as well as unnerving.  I don't think I have been called so many names since I was a child.  It flipped me back to the hurt girl that I used to be.  I am pretty sure I didn't even respond correctly. 
I am not someone that swears.  I used to could say that my children never heard me say a swear word, but I went through a time a while back that changed that.  I do know that it was a very hard habit to break.  It took a lot of perseverance and thinking about my words to change it.  I made me pause before I replied. 
That being said, I have never said the words that I was attacked with.  People who think words don't hurt, have never lived a life where they had to be afraid.  The words have always come, either before or during, abuse.  So for me, the words pack a little bit of a punch. 
It impacted every single one of us at work, and had the rest of the customers standing against the wall while this not gentleman engaged in a tirade. 
I was embarrassed for him as well as myself.  Number one, he doesn't know me if he thinks those words even begin to describe the person that I am.  Number two, well, his vocabulary is a little bit lacking.  Definitely on the side of baser things.  How terrible it must be if that is the only way he knows of to get his point across. 
So, just in case you wondered, a little swearing doesn't make me feel bad.  I get it that people are trying to make a point and sometimes a swear word feel better.  But, calling people names, especially the baser ones is not by any stretch of the imagination appropriate.  It is not kind.  It is not accurate.  It is not true.  And probably, the most important thing of all, it is not even necessary. 

Taking Offense

If you are on a common, 

continuous search to be offended, 

you will always find what you're looking for; even when it isn't there.

It is easy to be offended.  It is easy to be provoked.  It is easy to look for the negative with all the stresses in this life we lead.  All I have to do is stand behind a counter, or drive down the road and I manage of offend someone.  

I attended a conference where a councilor spoke about how we take things personally, and about the way we respond to anger and yelling and gestures.  She spoke about being happy, and about how it was possible, no matter what place in life you find yourself.

So, I made myself a promise.   I would try to be kinder in the words that I speak.  I would try to choose to act instead of react to the problems that I face.  I would lower my voice when I am angry instead of raising it to be heard.  This has been a week of experimenting.

I have discovered that when someone is yelling, if I lower my voice, they lower theirs.  I have found that saying "I'm sorry" goes along way toward calming down a disgruntled customer.  I am experiencing the results of my own kindness.  

When I search for the good in others, I find it.  If there is a misunderstanding, I am trying to straighten it out as soon as I realize it happened.  I am learning that it is up to me to choose what I find in life.  If I look for offense, it is all around me, and I am miserable because of it.  If I look for kindness, it is also all around me, and I am happier for seeing it in others.  

I am learning that it is up to me to decide what I am looking for.

Mormon 9:31 Condemn me not because of mine imperfection, neither my father, because of his imperfection, neither them who have written before him; but rather give thanks unto God that he hath made manifest unto you our imperfections, that ye may learn to be more wise than we have been.

An Uncertain Sound

1 Corinthians 14:8 "For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound,
who shall prepare himself to the battle?"

I heard this particular Scripture on Sunday.  I don't think that I ever noticed it before, but it made so much sense to me.  Sometimes it is so hard for others to understand us.  It seems as if, no matter what we say, they understand only what they want too.  The actual meanings of our words are lost inside their heads.  The trumpet of our speech makes an uncertain sound in their ears.  In everything we do, we must find the way to speak clearly.  We must make sure that we are not only heard, but that we are understood.  

It is easy to be offended by words.  I have learned it is especially easy to be offended when we think that we have a grudge to hold, or we are unforgiving or unrepentant toward others or even ourselves.  But I have also learned that being offended is a choice.  It is an action word.  It is not something that just happens to us, we choose to let it.  

That is the hard part, learning that it is our choice to take offence.  We want it to be someone else's problem.  We want it to be someone else's fault.  We want to judge someone else as "the person wearing the black hat", or the person who is less worthy.  Instead, we need to look inside ourselves and find what it is that makes us offended.  What it is that is giving off the uncertain sound in our own minds?  

Now, I am not saying that there is never a time when someone is trying to offend you.  That my friends, seems to happen all to often.  People get angry, they get hurt, they say things that they don't think about and don't always mean.  I wish that everyone of us could be just a little kinder to those around us; just a little less willing to pass judgement and condemnation; just a little more concerned with thinking things through before we speak.   

There is an old saying that goes something like,

"I know you think you understood what it was you thought you heard me say, but I am telling you that what you think you heard is not what I meant".  

I wish I could count the number of times that I have inserted my own foot in my mouth and said something that I regret.  Or even worse, the number of times that someone has not understood what I meant.  

I know that I can't change being hurt, sometimes, that just happens, and I can't change what anyone else thinks about me or feels about me, but I can my willingness to be offended and my willingness to forgive, even if they don't ask it of me.  I can change my own heart.  And that will make all the difference.