Dear Friends,
If you have been reading my work for a while, you know how important words are to me. How we speak to people--our tone and the words we choose--leave our lips and go out into the world affecting one person or thousands of people. It is more important than ever to be aware of what we choose to say and the purpose of using those words. I bring you a Q&A about our online course Speak with Purpose, Not Impulse.
With so many words coming at us twenty-four hours a day through social media and the non-stop news cycle, it can feel like our words have lost their meaning altogether. Somehow, we've almost become unconscious to the profound effect words have--the power to hurt and destroy, and repair and heal. This course is about learning, reconnecting, and growing, and will help you become less reactive, more aware and integrated, and less alienated. Through our use of words, we reveal our hearts to ourselves and to others, and by learning to speak consciously with purpose we can pause and truly listen amid the noise of our frantic modern world.
- Receive one lesson every day for 1 week (total of 7 lessons).
- Have lifetime access to the course for reference whenever you want.
- Select the amount you can afford, and get the same course as everyone.
- If you are not 100% satisfied, you may request a refund.
Q: What does it mean to Speak with Purpose, Not Impulse?
A: Speaking with Purpose, Not Impulse means entering deeply into the root causes and motivations that cause us to wield our words in impulsive, hurtful, and even destructive ways. It is the practice of bringing kinder and more conscious intention not only to the ways in which we interact with others but to ourselves too. So many of us do our best to speak meaningfully to others, but we fail to show this kindness and intentionality to ourselves, instead speaking critical and reactive words. Speaking with purpose means diving into our beings, locating the harsh words that reside there, and approaching them with a spirit of curiosity and compassion. It is about speaking with a desire to bring meaning to our speech and to serve others with our words.
Q: Why do we so often speak from impulse instead of purpose?
A: We speak without purpose because we are immersed in a culture that encourages us to speak loudly, to seek more, to brand our lives, and to brandish our opinions like weapons. We live in a social media era that values speed, competition, and instant gratification. In the context of these cultural values, we require real intentionality to become human beings who speak meaningful words. This course offers practices that help us develop this consciousness around our words.
There are also personal reasons for why we speak from impulse. For example, family can hold enormous influence over how we speak to others and ourselves. If we were raised in an environment where family members spoke over one another, we may struggle with conscious listening. If we were encouraged to remain silent, we may struggle with making our purpose known. Our personal witness to the behaviors around words in our childhood environments has the power to shape how we speak to ourselves and others throughout our lives.
Other causes can include insecurity, unresolved emotions, and unconsciousness. Insecurity can make us speak critically to ourselves, alienating us from purpose. When we feel insecure, we might use words to dominate others in an attempt to appear smart or powerful. This insecurity can also manifest as shouting, interrupting, or neediness to turn conversations toward ourselves.
When we carry unresolved emotions, we may move quickly into anger, self-pity, contempt, or deflection. This leads to acting and speaking impulsively. Strong, unconscious emotions activate self-protective stress hormones, which may drive us to react in the heat of the moment. We lose perspective and distance ourselves from our innermost selves. When we look back on our behavior, we may feel shame, which can lead to negative self-talk. Unresolved emotions have the power to create a cycle of impulsive, negative speech.
Unconsciousness is the umbrella over so many of the reasons we speak without purpose. We may think of unconsciousness as another word for impulsivity. Whether we have a habit of interrupting or live with a destructive inner critic, unconsciousness is present. We don't realize what's happening, and when we live in this state of unawareness, we have little hope to find purpose. It is a valuable and necessary challenge to step back and observe ourselves and to meaningfully direct our energy toward listening to and serving others.
Q: Why is it important to speak with purpose?
A: It is important to speak with purpose because words have power. The great poet Maya Angelou said, "Words are things." If words are indeed things, then they are things that can be used for better or worse. Words can be used as weapons, or they can be used as balms. Words can harm and heal. It is our choice how we use them. Words do not control us. We are in the driver's seat. It may seem easy to dismiss the profound power of words with tired phrases like, "Sticks and stones may hurt my bones, but words will never hurt me." But words do hurt. This phrase came from a time when as a society we shunned vulnerability. In many ways, we still do this, however, we are also collectively coming to consciousness about the need for vulnerability in healing as well as the enormous role verbal abuse plays in causing childhood trauma as well as trauma in relationship. Words have the power to affirm us, to turn us toward love, compassion, and creativity. This course is about developing the tools to regularly harness the power of words for growth and good in our own lives and the lives of others.
Q: How do we begin to speak with purpose?
A: The first step toward speaking with purpose is to start developing consciousness around our language and listening. It is very easy to move through life without ever pausing to notice the quality of our words and thoughts, especially when our egos hold onto fixed ideas of who we are--i.e., someone who never interrupts or utters an unkind word. Often it is those of us who cling to such ideas who find, once we begin consciousness work, that we do in fact have a tendency to interrupt or regularly speak unkind words to ourselves. In order to begin speaking with purpose, we must be willing to step outside of ourselves, pause, and witness. This involves not reacting to the incessant chatter in our minds and instead observe. This is the vantage point we need in order to become conscious to the negative behaviors and patterns in our words. It is a beautiful process of learning and renewal.
Q: Walk me through the journey of this course--how will it unfold for a student?
A: The course begins by defining our key terms--purpose and impulse. We will dive into the etymology of these terms in order to unpack their meaning in the context of speaking, as well as to move forward together on the same page about how they apply specifically to our course. We will then explore the personal and cultural reasons why we so often speak without purpose. Next we will move into the power words hold in our personal and collective lives. At that point we will then begin the healing process, so to speak, with lessons about the hope for transformation and the need for discernment as we cultivate consciousness around our words. Discernment is vital for change. It leads the way to purpose in our lives; if we practice purpose in our speech, we are also practicing discernment in our hearts. We will then move into the important relationship between intuition and impulse, using etymology as our foundation. There is a time and place for impulse, but the key to discerning whether impulse is reactive and potentially harmful is the presence of intuition. For our final lesson, we will explore simple, practical, and meaningful ways to apply these lessons to our daily lives. This concluding lesson also acknowledges the reality of the digital landscape in our lives and offers methods for speaking with purpose within those spaces. Many of us cannot entirely remove technology from our lives, but we can bring intentionality and consciousness to our interactions with it.
Q: Tell me about some of the homework included in the course.
A: All of the lessons are supported by journaling homework. The journaling in this course is personal and creative, asking you to look deeply into your own heart and soul, tune into your words and your intentions, listen, and notice. It is both gentle and challenging. Truth telling is the most important part of the journaling process. Your honesty about yourself is what will make the course transformative. This might feel a bit uncomfortable at times, for example, when the homework asks you to reflect on a time when words hurt you or you hurt another with your words. Most of the journaling homework will reacquaint you with your innermost self. It is the documentation of your heart, and it is yours alone.
Starting today, you will receive a new lesson every day for 1 week (total of 7 lessons). Each lesson is yours to keep and you'll be able to refer back to it whenever you want. And if you miss a lesson or are too busy to get to it that day, each lesson will conveniently remain in your account so you won't have to search for it when you're ready to get back to it.
We are offering this course with the option of selecting how much you want to pay. No matter how much you pay, you'll be getting the same course as everybody else. We simply trust that people are honest and will support the author of the course with whatever they can afford. And if you are not 100% satisfied, we will refund your money.
I hope you find this topic as interesting as I do. If you are interested in learning more about this topic, just click on the link. As always, any course you purchase is yours to keep, and you can work it at your own pace. Each course comes with a discussion group just for that particular course so you can journey through the work with other people if you choose. Until next time.
Be well,
Madisyn Taylor
Cofounder, Editor-in-Chief
