Sometimes, Silence is Golden

If you follow me on Facebook or Twitter, you may have seen some posts over the past week that indicate things haven’t been rosy in my little corner of the world.  I posted last week the following, “Honesty is the best policy, until someone gets hurt.  And then maybe it isn’t.”

I did something that was completely out of the normal for me last week.  I told someone how I felt about a situation.  The thing I didn’t take into consideration when I sent the email was that person’s feelings and how they felt about the situation.  I say it is out of the normal because if you’ve read my past few blog entries you know I’ve talked about how I’m a people pleaser.  A lot of times I don’t tell people exactly because I don't know what the reaction will be.

I say all this to say the following….I made a mistake.  A big one.  I hurt a very dear friend and I am not sure what the outcome will be.  I can’t take the words back, I can’t change what I said…I can’t change how I feel/felt.  However, I could have been more graceful in how I said what I was feeling.  And more than anything, I could have been more compassionate about how the other person might feel.  I let things become all about me.

If you know me well, then you know this isn’t my personality.  If you know me well, you also know I can’t help but worry and be concerned about the situation.  And finally if you know me well, you know I dwell on things.  So….I’m trying to start a new week on the right foot, but so far, it hasn’t been easy.

Think about what you say and how you’re going to say it.  If you think what you might say could be misinterpreted, wait a little while before saying it, sending that email or picking up the phone and rethink it after some time has passed.  I share this from a lesson learned.

The journey to 40 is not proving to be so easy….