One day I found myself editing the sentences in my mind. Adjusting them to suit the friend I was conversing with. Like a chameleon I take on the colours of the people around me. With the cultured I speak with elegance; with the chavs with a coarse bluntness; I curb the expression of my beliefs with those who may not understand; with the genteel I choose my words carefully so as not to risk offence.
I think I must find out who I am and stick with it. For though all the world’s a stage and all the people players, my poor mind struggles now to play more than one part. My mind, indeed, is not what it once was, thanks to technology…but perhaps that is for the best.
I wish I was always the elegant speaker but the switch for that seems to lie with my companions and not everyone flicks it on. There seems to be a braver truth in coarseness which elegance would almost conceal in its long and beautiful words. Politeness and curbed religious opinion can also hide the blunt and brutal truth. All this would point to coarseness as the truer road and yet…I find it unattractive in myself.
The middle road, famously the path of virtue, strikes again. A happy medium may be found in simple, clean words. The truth spoken without seeking approval from others, not trying to impress with big words or with coarse words. Still others must be considered to a certain extent. We all know from experience what a difference the manner of a manager can make, some address you in a way that makes it easy to take requests and even corrections, while others make the same request in a way that makes being contrary far too attractive.
God would have us love our neighbour as ourselves. Hence if I seek always to speak the truth, yet speak it with compassion I surely can’t go wrong. So let this be the banner under which I take my stand henceforth. “Truth Compassionate”.
Katherine Wansink Writes 