Oh, Powerful Words

“Words - so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them.”  ~Nathaniel Hawthorne

Such a true statement. Words used for good can move people to action, can change lives, or at the very least, the way we think. Positive words can gift people with confidence and happiness, and most importantly, the right words have the ability to give people hope.

And hope is one of life’s most powerful emotions.

Conversely, words used for evil can cut out hearts, start wars, fights, divorce, create anger, or destroy a person’s self confidence.  

And for some, anger is more powerful than hope.

One of the most important functions of writers is to learn how to pull emotions—like hope and anger, love and hate, happiness and misery—out of our readers. But this skill also tends to be helpful in our everyday lives. For everyone, not just writers.

How have someone else’s words affected you lately? How have your words affected someone else? 

Why Change is Important

I know I’ve promised to post about writing on Wednesdays, and life on Fridays. Don’t worry. Even though this post is going to start out with discussion about writing, it really is about life.

When I was first learning the important elements of writing a good story, I learned an important lesson. The story starts on the day when things change. This is when the main character (who we may, or may not already know for a few pages) has his or her world turned upside down.

Unfortunately, the reason this is such an important element of story is because this is the thing that gives us a harsh place from which the character can rise and grow.

This is also the case in real life. Change is inevitable. There is nothing we can do to avoid or stop it. Children grow up, relationships change, economic circumstances create difficulty or abundance, people get sick.

Some changes are welcome and exciting. Others are devastating. But all change helps us grow into the people we are, or who we need to become.

A lot of people I know are right now experiencing some serious changes in their lives. Hard changes. Exciting changes. Devastating changes. And I’m not going to tell them that everything will be okay. Maybe it won’t. Maybe things will be hard for a long time. Or maybe it will be okay and they’ll come out ahead or on the very top. But regardless of what each change means to each person, I hope they will remember one very important detail.

This is where your story begins. And all stories, regardless of if the ending is happy or tragic, end with one thing in common. Hope.

What recent changes in your life give you cause to hope?

A Gift No One Else Can Give

I don't believe in coincidence. At least, that's what I told the owner of the body shop where my car was fixed a few weeks ago. Timing, yes. Karma, definitely. But coincidence? Not so much. I just have a strong sense of things happening for a reason.

Usually, I can deal with events that might seem like a coincidence or whatever. I don't generally need an explanation for why something happens one way or another, or why the timing of two events coincide--either terribly or beautifully. It just is.

But I do believe in Irony. It hits me in the face almost daily lately. It's ironic what happened after I wrote and scheduled Monday's post about Mockingjay and how it made me feel. Raw and emotional. Sadness and peace. Hopeful and achy all at once.

There I was, typing along and pondering all these emotions, when I got one of those calls. The kind we all dread, telling us that someone we love has been severely injured or worse. In my case, this person is my twenty-one-year old step-brother Justin. He was seen skateboarding, hitting a bump or rock, and flying backward where his head--no helmet--hit the pavement. Someone stopped to help, called an ambulance, but it was already too late for Justin.

No Helmet. No brain activity. Alive, with no chance he'd ever come back.

He's had such a hard life in his short twenty-one years, lived through a tremendous amount of heartache, difficulty, and addiction. But while his loss leaves us all achy and raw, his generosity will give others hope.

Justin was an organ donor.

The damage from the accident was mainly in his brain. All his other organs are intact, whole, vital. In Justin's death, many other lives will potentially be saved or made better. He will now give other people a gift no one else could offer, the gift of life. And Justin will finally have the opportunity to be at peace.

Is it ironic that this week in our local news there has been a rash of freak accidents, shot police officers, and unexplained deaths? I don't know. But I do feel strongly that Justin's time on earth has come to an end. Whatever happened on that hill, happened because it was his time to go home.

Just as it's someone else's time to live. To have hope. And to move on.

Give someone else hope. Be an organ donor.

Love List Challenge: Day Two

The Grand essentials of happiness are: something to do, something to love, and something to hope for. ~Allan K. Chalmers

Today I love: Snuggles from my kids