Words- a privilege that is too often taken for granted. They can be a speech, sound, series of sounds, or anything that has meaning as a unit of language. No one truly understands how much power can be in a single word, making it ultimately the deadliest or the most beautiful weapon known to man. With words, we create ideas which create actions that shape who we are and what we want to be. With words, we have achieved greatness, but we have also achieved destruction, making it impossible for us to find the resolution, as to we are always knocking down what we have built up.
First of all, without words we would be nothing, have nothing, and feel nothing. They are used more often than anyone could imagine… Essentially, we use words to think and feel. For example when you have any type of physical or emotional feeling, your body communicates with your mind to find and solve the problem by asking questions like, “Why am I hurting? Where is it coming from? How do I fix it?”, and so on. This all happens in a matter of seconds, and is so instinctive that we don’t even have time to realize how much communication has just gone on. This shows that words define who we are and without them, there would be nothing because there would be no us.
Words have been used in the past as deadly, vicious weapons that have left lives in shambles because they were so strong. A particular moment in time that comes to mind is World War II. If Hitler had not been such a persuasive and powerful speaker, do you think that WWII would still have happened? He used his words to persuade thousands of other people that it was right to do what he wanted done… Something that took away and devastated millions of lives. He himself never forced anyone to believe in what he believed in, it was his ideas that created actions in other people. There are many accounts of this cruel, barbarous, abusive way words have been used to destroy in history.
There are so many accounts of evil ways words have been used in the past, but there are many beautiful things that have been done all because of words. Martin Luther King Jr. and Gandhi did not believe in violence, yet they led two of the greatest civil rights movements ever recorded in history. They used their words to persuade and convince other’s of their ways, which were to try and help society prosper and become better for everyone. They were great speakers who wanted the best for the world, and that is what makes their words beautiful, because they wanted to make the world a better, safer place.
Although these cases of good and evil differ greatly, there is one factor about them that makes them practically the same. These people used their words to convince and prompt other people of their ways. They each had an idea in mind that they were passionate about, and in turn they translated that passion into words that was meant to strike the hearts of the listeners. Their words were meant to rouse emotions in others and create certain actions, whether for good or bad, for better or for worse. Now the intentions of the words were complete opposites; as one is the “wrecking ball” of society while the other is a “building block”, they were powerful all the same.
We can use words in any way that we want. They have been used to create our society, civilization, and even the history of the world. Since the beginning of time we have been building on this “tower”, which is made up entirely of words, and is added to each and every day. But as we add more and more building blocks, making our tower taller and stronger, there becomes an even greater risk that there will be words used as “wrecking balls” which are meant to destroy all progress and to diminish the hopes and ideas of others. There is no way to avoid this inevitable decree: what goes up, must come down.
Everyone has this power in them. It is a right. It can be used as an ugly weapon, such as a dagger or a knife that can cut and wound another’s soul and be a wrecking ball to their tower. Or it can be used as a gift, beautiful like a rose. Something that when given to another person, helps to build them up and make them better and stronger, and to help to reinforce their tower. How we use our words solely depends on us, which means that we also must not be careless with our words because they can be a powerful weapon that can devastate or uplift…
Words are like fire; some people feed it and make it stronger and bigger, but they don’t fully understand that if you play with fire, you are likely to burn or get burned. This power shouldn’t be taken for granted, but in the end, it is something that can never be avoided.
