You Don’t Need to Speak Softly to Radiate Gentleness
A daily reminder to practice gentleness
As a child, it’s so easy to recognize the baddies in cartoons by listening to their evil laughter or the way they shout unkindly to others. As adults, we run into more ‘villains’ who smile and speak politely but gaslight other people constantly. On the other hand, we watch Korean dramas where the Korean heartthrob shouts out tear-jerking confessions of love to show just how much he cares about the woman of his life in a 'manly' way.
You don’t need to speak softly to radiate gentleness.
You don’t have to do that if that’s not who you are. You can mesmerize the world with your high-pitched laughter if that’s the way you usually laugh. You can continue to be blunt and honest if that’s the way you usually show kindness and concern to your loved ones.
We are starting to be more sensitive to the energy behind our voices and words. The standard phrases we used to say to show politeness and friendliness now bypass us easily as trance language where we tend to ignore. We light up when others are brave enough to speak with authenticity and empathy.
Time for you to self-reflect and share
If you were to self-reflect on the energy of a normal day’s worth of ‘public speeches’, what kind of a speaker would you describe yourself to be?
- Do you use your voice to connect and inspire, instead of pushing your agenda?
- Do you use your words to bring about clarity, instead of trying to avoid the impending conflict, or add fuel to fire?
- Do you show true concern with your texts, or merely to fulfill a social obligation?
- Is the energy behind your words filled with love and light, or congested with heaviness?
- Do you speak for the sake of speaking, or do you speak with a conscious intention?
- Are you willing to show your vulnerability and ask for help?
Sometimes, even with our best intentions, we radiate worry, fear, and panic instead of infusing love and actual concern in our words and actions.
How have you been defending yourself and attacking others through your words and actions? What would you say and do today to infuse more Gentleness into your reality?
Thank you for reading my daily reminder. If you would like to participate in this exercise, do share with us your answers to one or more of the questions mentioned above.
Spotlight on another writer
I’d love to share one Medium writer who radiates gentleness through his/her writing too. In this daily reminder, I recommend that you check out this beautiful prose-poem on kindness from Carolyn Riker:
This post is part of my daily infusion of Gentleness in December:
Love,
