Last night I felt the tickle of a cold in the back of my throat. A slight soreness crept upon me at bedtime and I told The Man o’ the House, “I’m catching a cold.” By this morning, I was in full prodromal immune response complete with sniffles, a bit of congestion, barely-noticeable elevated body temperature and cough.
Moving into the bathroom for the daily routine of chaos, my mind began to wander. Off it went on a neurolinguistic journey back to days when my Dad was still alive and we would talk about the words people used to convey meaning.
Words, or the choice of words, were important to my Dad.
He believed our choice of words affected us not only externally but internally as well. It is easy to understand how our word choice can affect us externally; communication is all about conveying meaning. Choose the right words to convey your thoughts and externally, the people around you, the folks who hear what you say and read what you write, process those words. All other things being equal, they receive the message as intended and respond.
Constructing our sentences in such a way that we successfully convey our intended meaning to the outside world is the basis of good communication.
But structure and word choice are also important internally as our thoughts are shaped by the messages we send ourselves. Dad was a firm believer in being aware of the way we speak to our Self because he believed it shaped us inside as well.
Our thoughts and our words affect every cell in our body, set the tone for our mood and lay the foundation for our interaction with others.
Dad rarely got sick. But when he did, he waged war with Vitamin C, vivid imagery and words as weapons. My Dad would not “catch” a cold; afterall, “catching” is an active, almost invited action. No. There was no cold-catching going on in my Dad’s house.
If my Dad got sick, he was invaded. And invasions are always unwelcome.
And so this morning, paying homage to my Dad, I declared, “War,” on “the invader.” Note the singular and not the plural form of the word. It’s so much easier to wage war against a singular enemy.
I applaud my immune system for its alertness and fast response; B-cells and T-cells reported for duty (I’m calling up the entire Army). No sleeping on the job for my immune system – no ma’am! They’ve been chomping at the bit for a moment like this. Afterall, it sharpens their skills and prepares them for their next battle.
I envision those B-cells blasting out antibodies, binding to and laying waste to the unwelcome visitor that thought my immune system wouldn’t notice its presence. HA! Right now, as I write, macrophages are engulfing the little bastards, laying siege to their dying, defenseless army.
I smiled at the memories of my Dad and the way I absorbed his words, took them in and made them my own. Moving around the bathroom, I wondered if The Bubblette had left me any hot water after readying herself for school.
And then I realized the singlemost important contribution of George W. Bush’s presidency to the world. (I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of it before.)
It’s just a phrase. But it’s become a powerful mantra in my neurolinguistic Cold war.
We’re gonna smoke ‘em out!
