It doesn’t serve us well to repeatedly recall the words spoken to us that hurt and yet somehow our minds remember those more easily than most others. As I’ve written about before, I have seen emotional improvements in my own life when I’ve intentionally spoken positive truths to myself regularly. We can’t stop the mean things people might say to us, but we can chose what we believe and what we say to ourselves.

I’m really excited by today’s challenge. Rather than the challenge be about us, the challenge is to encourage someone else. Who knows what the ‘someone’ we’re thinking of might have heard already today, and what power our words might have to influence how they feel now. The scripture Downs quotes finishes “the tongue of the wise beings healing.” What a gift we can give to someone today. What a privilege we have to be the ones bringing the gift, being part of the healing.