Be Strong, Be Kind (When Not To Say Something)

"Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting movement," wrote Benjamin Franklin. In this talk, we explore four steps to follow so that our words can always be kind in all situations. Because to be kind is to be strong.
(Please note, this is a talk, not a guided meditation.)

Transcript

Welcome to the Happiness Podcast.

I'm Dr.

Robert Puff.

I know this may sound strange,

But sometimes the hardest thing to do is to be kind.

There's a beautiful quote by Benjamin Franklin where he says the following,

Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place but far more difficult still to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.

Sometimes when people hurt us we want to hurt them back and we really want to find something that causes them to suffer.

We do this because they're hurting us and we want to get them back for what they're doing to us.

It feels justified,

It feels right,

And it can even feel good at the moment.

But I think we all know if we've lived long enough that our words are incredibly powerful and after the dust settles and everything calms down we usually wish we'd never said those words.

And do you know how we justify saying those horrible things?

We say,

Well I was mad and that's the answer.

Because I was mad I had the right to say those things.

I was angry at you and you deserve those things even though I wish hadn't said them later.

Now I'm sure there are a few people out there listening to this that think they're justified in what they said.

That person deserved it.

I don't agree and that's okay.

We don't have to agree on everything.

But for those of you who have said horrible things to other people and want to learn how not to do that,

This podcast,

This talk,

Is for you.

And you know not saying something takes a lot more strength than saying something.

And it feels like it's a weakness but it's not.

It's actually one of the strongest most powerful things we can do in life.

Let me use an example.

I don't know if you ever saw the movie Gladiator.

It was produced in 2000 and it really did well.

It ended up winning the best picture with the Academy Awards and Best Actor was won by Russell Crowe.

Like you,

I've seen a lot of movies.

I enjoy movies.

I find them a lot of fun.

But movies are often very predictable,

I suppose,

Because human behavior is very predictable.

What typically happens in a movie is one antagonist says something really mean to a protagonist and that gives the main character license to really come back and hurt the other person with either words or with their actions.

It's very predictable.

It happens pretty much in all movies.

But not in Gladiator.

If you remember the very end scene where the gladiator,

Russell Crowe,

Is fighting the Emperor.

The Emperor,

After the gladiator,

Is pretty beaten down.

Says some horrible,

Terrible things about his wife and his children.

What was done to them when he had them killed.

Normally,

What someone would do in this situation is get rageful and attack the person.

But the gladiator didn't do that.

He stayed calm.

He stayed quiet.

And he just finished the battle with the Emperor with equipoise.

I was so shocked when I saw this because we so often don't see this.

And it's because it takes so much strength to restrain ourselves and not lash back at people that hurt us.

And I can't imagine anything more hurtful than hearing horrible things that were done to our spouse and our children when they were murdered.

And yet,

He didn't let the words affect him.

And he didn't lash back.

It was one of the most beautiful scenes in movie history and I'll remember it throughout my life.

It isn't easy to do,

But to do it,

We have to be strong.

And if we can find the strength to do it,

What we'll find is incredible,

Incredible love for ourselves.

And being proud of who we are.

Because we can stand above the attacks,

The horrible things that people can do to us.

And we all know when they're done to us.

I've had them done to me many,

Many times.

And I'm so thankful the universe has taught me how not to lash back,

How to be still and not attack.

It's easy to attack.

It's far more difficult to restrain and not say anything.

But today,

We are going to learn how to do that.

And it involves four things,

Four steps that we have to go through in order to not say something that we wish we hadn't said later.

The first thing is our emotions are very powerful.

And when they come,

We need to always pause.

We never react on our emotions.

We look at them,

We observe them,

We examine them,

But we pause.

We pause because the initial knee-jerk response probably won't be the correct one.

It may be in some situations,

But often when it's a verbal attack coming our way,

That's when we pause.

We just pause.

And then the second thing we do,

We have to decide ahead of time that lashing out at people that lash out on us is wrong.

It is not what we want to do.

It's not something we're going to engage in and something we choose never to participate in.

It has to be a choice.

It's kind of like thinking of an alcoholic who says,

I can never drink again.

We decide that we will never in any circumstances lash out with cruelty towards another no matter what they're doing.

It doesn't mean we can't set boundaries,

Which we'll talk about next,

But it does mean we decide to the deep core of our being that saying unkind things at tempting moments is something we will not participate in ever.

And we have to decide that.

If you think it's correct that an eye for an eye is a good way to go,

Or if they punch me,

I'm going to punch them back,

Then this path will be very challenging for you.

But if you really decide that,

Yes,

I understand lashing out at someone who's lashing out at me is never,

Ever the right way to go.

So I'm going to work really hard at ahead of time deciding that's a path I will not go down.

Now,

Of course,

We might mess up at first,

So we have to be kind with ourselves.

But when we mess up,

These are the words we can say,

What can I learn from this going forward?

A lot of times it's that pause.

That pause can remind us that,

Oh yeah,

I'm not going to lash back no matter what they say.

I'm just not.

And then that's a really good way to live life.

And we realize that,

And that's what we choose to do it.

We want to be happy.

We want to find joy in ourselves.

We want to look in the mirror and say,

I like you.

We're going to do that by not participating in cruelty towards others,

No matter what they do to us.

Period.

That's the second thing we do.

And then the third thing we do when we are in these situations is we just stay quiet.

That's right.

We just stay quiet.

It's so tempting to say something back and they'll peter out whoever's attacking us.

They can't just keep going and going and going.

If they're verbally assailing us,

Keep quiet.

It's that simple.

Just keep quiet.

And then finally,

The fourth thing is,

Of course,

Remove ourselves from these situations.

They're horrible.

They're awful.

So get away from there as soon as possible.

If you need to call the police,

Call the police.

Absolutely.

If you need to move out and move in with your parent,

You do that.

If you need to never speak to this person,

Again,

Because of what they did to you,

Great.

If that's what you need to do,

Just don't lash back.

And the way we do that is we remove ourselves from people that act that way,

Or more importantly,

When they are acting that way.

For example,

Sometimes our kids can say some pretty amazing things.

If you've been a parent,

You probably know what I mean.

Obviously,

We can't permanently remove ourselves from our kids.

But what we can do is remove ourselves from the situation.

And we just do that.

I know sometimes it's very challenging.

But if we're going to be still,

The person will wear out.

They'll stop yelling at us if we're quiet.

And then again,

Just remove ourselves from the situation as fast as possible.

And with that,

Make sure we're surrounding ourselves with people that are super kind,

Super loving,

And that would never do that to us.

Everyone in my inner circle is very kind.

We need to surround ourselves with people that don't participate in this type of behavior.

They're like the place where we go to rest and feel safe.

We need to have these safe people in our lives,

Because then we can relax.

And the truth of it is,

We need to spend a lot of our time with these safe people.

I know sometimes we can't get away from cruelty of others.

Perhaps we're at a workplace.

Perhaps we're in a living situation where we just can't get away from it.

But if we don't participate in it,

If we don't create enemies,

If we set boundaries when we can,

And get other people to help us when we can,

It can go pretty well.

I know this is a hard journey,

But that's why I entitled this,

Be Strong,

Be Kind,

Because we have to be strong not to attack others.

It takes far more strength to not hurt others than it does to hurt others.

It's so easy to attack and be cruel when we're upset.

It's far harder to be still.

But the rewards of this are so amazing.

You will love it.

If you could just try it for a little bit when you're driving and someone does something to you.

Don't go rageful when you're at a store and someone does something to you.

Don't be rageful.

Don't say mean things.

And if you do say something silly,

Go back and apologize.

I've done that.

Sometimes I'm frustrated by something.

I'll go back and apologize.

I'll say,

I'm sorry.

I was a little frustrated by the situation,

But I could have been nicer and I wanted to apologize.

It's a great way to live life.

And you'll love the feeling when you do this.

There's only one way to find out is by trying it.

And I know some listeners are really not going to agree with me.

I get that.

But I have done this journey for a while.

It works for me.

Perhaps it will work for you.

And the worst thing that will happen is there'll be a lot less collateral damage in the world when we do this,

Because even those others can be so cruel sometimes,

We won't be cruel back.

And I think that will make our world a better place for us to live in.

And one last benefit of choosing this path of kindness,

The number one person that we're harsh on is ourselves.

We can be so mean to ourselves throughout the day.

If we begin to be quiet,

Be kind,

What we'll find is when we look in that mirror with time,

We'll begin to sense a feeling of love towards ourselves and find that instead of self-hatred or depression or anxiety,

There'll be peace and joy in our lives.

We can all have this.

It does take work.

It takes effort.

But if we try to do this and really work on this skill,

I think we'll find that our lives can truly become a beautiful adventure.

Thank you for joining me on the happiness podcast.

Until next time,

Accept what is,

Love what is.

Reviews

This is very powerful,.. thank you for the reminder to take the high road🙏✨🙏

I’ve been living like this for years and it is sooo much better for my spirit to not regret something I’ve said. I figure that when someone is cruel it’s really their issue. Thanks for reinforcing my belief 🙏🏼

Thank you 🙏

Thank you Dr. Puff, grateful for your peaceful examples. Sending good wishes.

Really appreciated the simple steps suggested for maintaining commitment to kindness.
Thank you!