What are my thoughts saying for me?

Someone called me a bitch recently. It’s something that in equal parts baffled me and left me feeling rather nonplussed because the word appears to get bandied about so readily these days. I blame American reality tv because I can’t even tell if it’s meant as an insult (“that bitch!”) or endearing (“heyyyy, what up, my bitchezzz!”). I am gathering, though, it possibly takes one to identify one – perhaps if someone naturally thinks like a bitch (whatever that means!), they will automatically reach for that word as a label of another. *pauses to ponder that thought*

Being accused of being a bitch gave me cause to cast my mind back to the last time I was called a bitch. About seven years ago, it was. Someone I had loved and supported tirelessly hurled the label at me in a spray of other word bullets via email as the assailant left the building (and my life), never to return. I imagine that particular person’s opinion of me won’t have changed, for there has been no further opportunity to rediscover me. A shame, really, as it’s quite clear to me that that person never really knew me if my identifying label in her eyes was… Bitch.

This most recent time, the other party retracted the statement after it was discovered I hadn’t been a part of an incident as had incorrectly been assumed. I gather the view of me as a bitch – as it apparently hinged on my being involved in something that I was largely unaware was even going on – fizzled somewhat after that. But who knows? If it’s a fall-back attitude to have towards others, the label might remain. So be it. *shrug*

I’ve called myself a bitch before. I have tried to claim the title over the years. More than one girlfriend has laughed me off and said I couldn’t be a bitch if I tried. One of them even decided to try and point out “bitches” when we were sitting at a shopping centre café one day. “She’s one, she’s one… she’s not, she’s been one all her life….” I was gobsmacked. By her authority on the subject and her willingness to point at strangers and label them so confidently. Me, I feel as uncomfortable labelling anyone anything, let alone thinking something so personal and negative as “bitch” that I come off as awkward as Hugh Grant in Notting Hill when he says it after Julia Roberts “steals” the flowers he was taking to his “sick grandmother” after their fake interview for Horse & Hound.

As far as being a bitch goes, it would appear I’m not very good at it.

I don’t naturally grab for describing words when I am thinking or talking about people. In fact, my mind trains into a blank if I don’t feel particularly positive about a person – I am still practicing that part, it can be very difficult to do, but I do try always. Having grown up with a mother who would go as far as laughing at others, so intent and natural was she at belittling, I have had a good rolemodel not to emulate. I identified early that it something I never wanted to aspire to. And I trust that because I trained myself out of that particular trait during my adolescent years, I have raised a girl who won’t naturally reach for those sorts of words to label others with.

Sure, I lost my way and got caught up in the naming and shaming as many are wont to do at some point in their lives (some enjoy it, it’s a sort of sport, isn’t it? Imagine that competition at the Olympics….. no, thanks!). But so many things changed in my life about ten years ago and this was one of them. I realised the harm it was not only inflicting on them, but was also causing me, anytime I used derogatory words to make myself feel better than.

Better than what or whom, exactly? I’m not sure. Better than another, I suppose. And that’s not anything I want to instil in my child. I want to be equal with others. I want her to feel the same. Not better. Nobody is better. Not because of the car they drive, the clothes they wear, how tidy they keep their home or where that home is. Not the job they have, not the colour of their skin or the country they live in or their lunchbox contents or the music they listen to or how they wear their hair or who they befriend. Nobody. Better than no one.

Aren’t humans interesting? Tiring. But interesting. Somewhere, somehow, as unaffected as you believe yourself to be, your thoughts towards others will be making their energetic mark on you – good or otherwise. Call me a bitch if you will, but who is it really harming? Not me. I don’t think like one and I don’t act like one so I’m blissfully unaware of what that even means, to be a bitch. Mind you…. catch Steve on a candid day and he might allow you to ask him if I have Bitch Potential. He is possibly the only person on the planet who would be justified in using the word and I’d have to accede because, oh boy, can I let fly on particular subjects of shared responsibilities at certain times of the month when there’s no chocolate in the house and he’s not read my mind. AGAIN….

 

A thought is as good as spoken, energetically speaking. How are your thoughts harming or helping you? Have you checked what they are doing and where they are going lately? Can you find any correlation between your energy levels or your health and your thoughts that you believe are so private and unharmful as long as you don’t speak them?