Becoming A Social Influencer

I read an article a while back that noted that in recent brain research scientists determined that humans have as many as 6,000 thoughts per day.  I am not a scientist, have not conducted brain research, and I did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but I venture a guess that if those folks in the study were polled 48 hours later, they might recall less than a 100  of those 6,000 thoughts they had that day.  Hell, my wife would be impressed if I remember a handful of them.  All that to get to this.  Friday my friend Matt Dow shared this one thought, one of his 6,000, which became one of my 6,000, a lesson Matt learned from a friend of his, Bill Baker — “Speak words that bless.”  

“Speak words that bless.”  Four words, one lesson, one thought.  As they rumbled around in my head on a Saturday morning long run, the power started to become obvious.  While I am sure I don’t have 6,000 opportunities to speak in a given day (I hear the collective sigh of relief) there are at least some opportunities to do so, and if one adds in texts, emails, and various other electronic means of communications, those opportunities to “speak” multiply.  That is, in social media terms, we become, on some scale, “social influencers.”  There are, of course, other choices on the “Speaking Menu.”  Each chance to speak provides an opportunity to “speak words that DO NOT bless.”  While my ability to discuss that option is ample, on that I am going to invoke my 5^th Amendment right against self-incrimination and simply note that my personal research over the past 48 hours suggests that this “speak words that bless” thing is pretty damn powerful, even if the best one can do is sprinkle a few “words that bless” in with all those other words that don’t.  So go ahead, become a social influencer, make someone’s day, and yours too – “Speak words that bless.”