Hi Son,
Another great week has started! I’m ready to dive in and explore all of the wonderful possibilities and adventures the week has to offer! How about you?
I ran across another cool quote that I just had to share with you. Here it is, “Remember that how you speak about others speaks loudest about yourself” – Bear Grylls
Does the quote resonate with you? What does it say to you?
When I think about that quote, I think about a particular friend of mine. So, what about this friend of mine? Well, this particular friend seems to be continually bad-mouthing other people. As he was my friend, I didn’t really think much about it. Maybe somewhere deep inside I thought that these people had wronged him in some way and that resulted in him saying unkind things about them.
Now here’s the interesting part. I didn’t really think much about how my friend bad-mouthed other people, until we had a conversation where he was extremely angry and verbally abusive towards me. The truth is, I was shocked to hear him speak that way to me as I thought I’d always been supportive of him as a friend. Well, regardless of how supportive I was of him, apparently it wasn’t appreciated!
To make matters even worse, I had another follow-up conversation with my friend and he was equally angry and abusive during that conversation as well.
I was trying to be understanding of my friend’s anger and abusive outbursts. One reason I wanted to be understanding is that I knew he was going through a tough time. I know we all go through tough times here and there in life, but it seemed as if he wanted to blame the bulk of his unstable and unhappy life on me.
Now was my friend bad-mouthing me to other people? Of course, he was. The interesting thing is I hadn’t noticed that he has basically bad-mouthed almost every person he spoke of at some point in time or the other. It’s funny how I didn’t notice or think much of this until it was, “my turn to be bad-mouthed and rolled under the bus”.
So, according to the quote from Bear Grylls, how my friend was speaking about others was actually speaking loudest about him. Now, I’m not saying that my friend is a bad person. I believe that my friend is hurting and for some reason is unable to look in the mirror and place the blame for his pain on himself. Unfortunately, this type of behavior is far more common than either you or I could imagine.
Well, that’s all for now!
Have an amazing day and know that you are in my thoughts and prayers!
Love,
Dad