In A Little Book on the Human Shadow, the National Book Award-winning poet, storyteller, and all around troublemaker Robert Bly tells us that using language carefully is one of the best ways to keep from spewing our shadow material and our projections on others wherever we go.

I haven't read that book in several years, but it must've sunk in further than I know, because the other way I woke up thinking

Strive for

more accuracy

with

less judgment.

So I wrote the phrase down and put it up over the kitchen sink, where I've been forced to stare at it ever since. Strive for more accuracy with less judgment. Humph.

We are all products of a black/white, either/or, right/wrong system of thinking. Which, as far as the range of human interaction actually goes, is about like trying to cram a large square peg into a small round hole. It's too limiting for ease or comfort, much less accuracy. And women, in particular, are groomed to say things for effect. We're trained to exaggerate, to stand out in a crowd. Men jump up and touch the awning. Women embellish.

Consider: I could say about my grandson, "He won't eat anything but fruit!" Or I could say about my grandson, "He really seems to be enjoying fruit these days."

The first statement locks him into a certain course of action. (And of course lets me off the hook about trying to get a balanced diet into the kid.)

The second statement allows him to experiment with fruit now, and then change and grow into enjoying other foods later.

The first statement sounds sort of whining and accusing, and it hands more power over to the baby than he's actually equipped to handle at such a young age.

The second statement simply says what is, without saying anything else.

Interesting.