I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how careful I am, and how careful many people I know are. By careful I don’t mean full of care, which is a good thing, but careful as in being really wary. So when a good idea springs up, it get squashed before it ever gets out.
I wonder if this is a tragic byproduct of our information age, we think of all the permeatations of how others might receive what we say and do, that old cliche, paralysis by analysis.
I played around for a while with a concept I called ‘blurt’ which was encouraging people to say what was on their mind, and trust that what welled up from their unconscious was useful, without sharp editing and pruning.
This runs completely counter to the useful advice to ‘think before you speak’. It depends on what the thinking is.
Being outspoken occurs as dangerous, and we can all put ‘our feet in our mouths’ from time to time.
But if our intension is not about ourselves, but for making a difference for others, ‘blurting’ something out is more honest, more compelling, more giving, and ultimately more effective that carefully engineered speaking.
Being ‘outspoken’ can be a craft, to show oneself honestly, to be authentic is soemthing we can all develop, to be heard, to be unique, and to live more fully through taking risks.
The funny thing is that sometimes these things happen anyway. Yesterday I blurted something out, and talked about ‘downlouding’ instead of ‘downloading.’ It was my head, heart and mind not quite in synch. Or may be it was because my companion thought the new term was pretty funny, and we played with the concept. I think or I ‘blurt’ that it is time for us all to be Down Loud, be heard and speak from our hearts and minds and be at risk.