Have your senses ever been assaulted by a mere word? This is one of the words that do it for me! When I see this word, my body immediately recoils from a past experience with a pungent smell…similar to the image below. What about you?
Words are so powerful…even when unspoken! I want to explore that dynamic with this word, so let’s dive in!
Oxford Dictionaries define pungent as:
having a sharply strong taste or smell
(of comment, criticism, or humor) having a sharp and caustic quality.
I have shared my experience of this word on the olfactory organs of the body and the objects that stimulate that sensory response. I am most interested in the second definition of this word:
‘having a sharp and caustic quality’ (as it relates to your words)
Our words have impact. Our words can create our reality – for positive or negative results. Our words are sharp and powerful. When we consider the power that can be unleashed by one of the smallest members of our body, I am amazed how often we carelessly deposit this seeds into the world without concern for the outcome. I am convinced many are unaware of the power within them and that the life they live is directly impacted by it.
Our lives can look like this colorful, lush and beautiful garden. Filled with a harvest of words sown in love, peace, hope and wholeness. Encouraging one another, speaking love despite experiencing the opposite, standing on faith rather than fear. Those decisions produce a garden of life that would resemble this image. Does this resemble your life?
Or does this…
Through the power of your pungent, bitter and life draining words, you can manifest a garden of life that looks barren, unfruitful and desolate. Speaking words of hate towards another, harboring bitterness, walking in fear and doubt. These decisions will produce a life that no one willingly desires. But how many of us can, unfortunately, relate to these images? Take inventory of your daily self-talk. Are your words life given or life taking?
Our words mean more than the surface definition – they create life! Be intentional with your words and your thoughts! Pungent words will produce a pungent, bitter life. Do you want others to recoil when they encounter your presence? Choose your words wisely and intentionally today and wait with expectant hope for your beautiful garden of life to unfold!