The Words We Use

Every day we spend time talking to people, and we express our thoughts through the use of words. Now, each of the words we use can have several meanings depending on the context they are said in, the tone they are said with, and the culture they belong to. As we are all aware, not all things mean the same things in all places. So we do our best to express ourselves with the use of words, but do we give this expression much thought as to how we are shaping ourselves by their use?

In my conversations with people these days I have begun to notice a trend; we use words with no real value to convey an idea rather than a truth. For example, how many times in the last week or so have you used the word happy? Now, happy is a great little word that implies a nice meaning. If I said to you that I wished you a happy birthday, most would think that was a pleasant thing to do; or if you told someone that you just wanted to be happy, well that is admirable, after all who doesn’t want to be happy? Now, let’s stop and think about it a minute though, what is happiness? What emotion does it stir when I use the word? What is my expectation that happiness should do for me? For most of us we have what we call happy memories. Those times in our past when we had those pleasurable bursts of elation, like on a birthday or Christmas morning. Being honest, it is most likely when we are on the receiving end on something good that came to us a little or no cost. So now when we use this word in our everyday language, such as “I just wish I could be happy,” what idea are we re-enforcing to ourselves? Is it our intent that we should live a life of Christmas mornings? Our instant response is of course to say no because that’s not realistic, but the truth is yes, we really do wish for a life of Christmas mornings. If I am honest with the full length mirror, that reflection staring at me has a deep longing for a no-cost life full of nonstop elations, where life goes my way for no other reason than I am me. We all know intellectually that that kind of expectation cannot possibly ever be met, so why do we use the word? Are we a group of people just living for that next spark or moment of no-cost bliss? It’s my experience that we use words like happy because to use the word joy carries a very different feel for most of us. “Have a joyful birthday” just doesn’t have the same ring to it. Joy is like the word happy, but we know joy does not come without cost. The easiest way to describe the difference between the two is this, when my first son was born I was not at all happy, but I was filled with a deep sense of joy. You see, there was an experience I had to live through, an event I had to watch, that was not at all a happy one, but without the unpleasantness of the birthing process I would not have experienced the joy that process brought. My son could have been born, no fuss, no muss, but without seeing the cost of what it takes to bring life into this world, and the awesome creative power of the divine for that little person to get here, I might just take the new person for granted when they fail to make me happy. Joy and happiness are two very different ideas. I am not against happiness at all. In fact I am all for it, but it will never take the place of what brings me joy, nor would I every trade one for the other.

So what’s the big deal with words? Words re-enforce ideas and feelings in the moments we use them. If you read enough studies of human behaviour you will see a trend that shows that people who use the word happy, but never talk about joy, are in fact some of the most unhappy people around. So little of our time, and even fewer of our words, are spent in recognition of the things of utmost importance. How often do we spend talking about the things that bring us joy? Probably about as much as we talk about the things that we love. Don’t believe me? Just go to your mall and sit down and watch the people go by with the bags full of all the new things they have just purchased. Are they all full of joy? Not likely. Almost 30 to 50 percent will be unhappy with their purchase in the first 30 days, why? Because we are a people who are chasing things to make us happy because the price tag on joy is simply too high. Joy is by far too messy, and joy has far too high of a demand on my time, so for the most part we settle for happy.

Whether we intend it to or not, our words betray us. We often try to hide behind them, and we try to convince others with them, but they never fail to give away our true feelings. In this world, words are our first point of contact with others and yet we fill those conversations with words that are of little value. Now you can ask why and there are probably as many reasons as we have words, but one underlying thing becomes apparent: when we talk to each other, we use our words as our first line of defense. We use the words we do because of how they make us feel when we use them. I am a lot more likely to talk about things that might make me happy with a person I don’t know so well, and the things that bring me joy with someone I am close too. The challenge is though, how many people are we really close with? How often do we spend time with the people close to us using real words? Our present age has afforded us more information that almost any other age before it and yet, for all that information, we are losing the ability to communicate in a way that matters most. Joy comes from struggle, but who was there to share the struggle with you? If no one, then who can share in your joy? Never before have so many been so connected by the internet, yet so many feel so alone. Words like love and joy in the vacuum of social media do not carry the same weight as when you are across the table from the people you care about and who care about you.

God has communicated His intent toward us in words, in volumes of printed lives lived so that we might grapple with His love toward us, but how much time have we spent this past month sharing how His words have impacted our lives with others? I am not talking about evangelism, I am talking about sharing the struggles that produced those moments of joy, those seasons of love. We need to strive as an eternal family to restore our relationships so that we can share with each other the words that matter most. So that our words of joy, love, fear and hurt can be heard by those who are there to share in these experiences with us. If we cannot learn to once again build bridges into each other’s lives, how will we ever be able to share the moments and the words that matter? If we are not there to share someone’s burden, how will we know their joy?

I spend a lot of time each week talking, but not much of my week is spent in sharing. A lot of my words are filler words, not feeling words. It is my prayer that as we work together to build bridges with each other that we can begin to share the lows and experience the highs, and that our words are once again filled with the meaning and passion that has the power to change lives.

Shalom

Jay.