Round 7, Day 11: Words & Choice

In the past five months, I've had two "friendships" end poorly. [I use quotes around the word friend because I it took some ugly interactions for me to realize these people were never my friend in the first place.  But when these things happened, I assumed they were my friends.]  What these endings have in common is the method of the ending: emails. In these emails, ugly things were written to me about me.

The first "friend" shared my emails to her with the second "friend". They sat and read them and discussed them. While I find their actions immature for women in their 40s, I recognize that when we write something, it becomes larger than us, even if it is intended for only an audience of one.  One should write knowing this could happen.

Still, I find their actions creepy. I found it creepier when the second person met me for lunch and told me they'd done it. She admitted she thought I might feel violated by her reading my emails without my consent, but did it anyway.  They wanted to figure out why I didn't want to be the first person's "friend" any longer. Since reading my emails didn't provide ample (for them) reason, and I didn't want to talk to the first person any more, why didn't I just tell the woman sitting across from me?

Why, indeed?

Later, this lunch "friend" sent me an ugly email about a third person, included in their rant was selected copied text from the third person's correspondence. The third person wrote about abuse they'd endured as a child. This was the second person's "proof" of how awful this third person was.

I was appalled to read someone assess another person as awful because they'd been abused.

I think it is a moral violation to copy selected text from a person's confessional correspondence and then send it to a third person to use to attack their character. I was so disgusted to receive something like this that I couldn't share the violation with the person whose privacy had been violated. I was ashamed for the person who did this. Ashamed for her lack of feeling for a person who'd been abused. Ashamed for her lack of respect for another.

In both cases, I succumbed to responding back in email. At first, I tried to calmly address the issues. But when met with responding ugly tirades and irrational insults that questioned my very nature, I admit I took off the gloves. What I had to say was truthful, and if my statements were copied and circulated (as they probably were), I'd stand behind them. But-

BUT. This is not who I want to be. I don't want to spread any more ugliness in this world. We have enough of it. So, even if what I see is wrong, I don't want to succumb to the temptation to deliver the shocking words.

The other day, it dawned on me: people who act like this will pay consequences for their actions.  The laws of reciprocal actions dictate this. Karma or is it dharma? if you will. They will pay; I don't need to be the one to deliver the bill.

From all this ugliness, I've concluded a few things about the words we use. The conclusions come from watching Oprah's documentary on Maya Angelou. Maya said that words are powerful. Words are real things. Without words, Maya could not have gotten to the United Nations where she was invited to wrote a poem to the world. Can you imagine: being invited to write a poem to the world?

Why say ugly things when you could be writing a love poem to the world?

If words are real things, as Maya swears they are, and I agree that they are: do you want to send out arrows or flowers? I know, for myself, I've had enough arrows to last a lifetime. Now, when my fingers caress the keyboard, when my lips open, I want petals to float out to all that read and hear my words.

So, for these experiences, this is my word today:

intent

How does intent roll through your life?