Communication depends a lot on the words you choose to form a sentence. Using a synonym for a word can change the entirety of how someone may receive what you’re trying to say. Even if you may not notice, the words you choose reflect a lot, even the idea about how much time and thought you put into choosing your words say a lot about what you intend to say. For example in relationships if you’re careless with your words they show a lot about how you feel towards that person. If you’re careless with your words it can show how you don’t care about the relationship with the person and how what you say may affect them if you don’t put time into considering how you might hurt them with words. Even when it comes to a relationship with yourself and the respect you have for yourself. The words you use to think about yourself matters because you’re believing those words and they can bring down or uplift the way you perceive yourself. Certain words have emotions tied to them, so when using words it’s important to think about how they may affect others and yourself. 

People may not realize how intentional everything is. There were times in my past relationship where we would get into arguments. I remember in my past relationship when we would get into arguments and she would intentionally be rude because she knew how much I disliked when she was rude while we were arguing. I thought of it as her making things worse while she thought of it as just making it clear that she was upset. Most times I would always be the first to apologize because she wouldn’t listen to me unless she won an argument. By getting me to always apologize first she always took that as her being justified and instead I learned that the only way to be listened to was once we made up by having me apologize to her. Her doing this gaslit me into thinking that I was always in the wrong even when she would do things like talk to her exes while we dated. 

Just as much as words can hurt someone into thinking they’re always wrong, words can also make someone feel better. Awhile ago my friend was telling me how she felt horrible about her gpa because she slacked during a semester and she was explaining how she felt like she wasn’t doing good enough. I asked her to tell me and that she doesn’t have to be ashamed. I was then able to put  it into perspective and I explained to her how she’s not doing as bad as she thinks she is and she’s actually doing pretty well. She explained to me how her advisor made her feel dumb because of her gpa and when she put it into percentage she agreed that she was doing much better than how he made her feel. I explained to her that some advisors do that because there are certain law schools that require very high gpa’s but that doesn’t necessarily mean hers is “too low” and it doesn’t make her dumb, nor should it make her feel dumb. She then told me how she felt much better and how she was panicking over her grade and future. Through the words that I chose I was able to change her perspective on how she was doing and encourage her to do better at the same time.

To conclude, words can be both encouraging and harmful. It is important to think about how you use your words and what your intentions are with them. The words you choose will always affect someone, it is up to you to decide whether to affect someone positively or negatively. Learning how to use words to empower both yourself and others can prove to affect your life very positively.