The other day I met a lady, who I thought would turn out to be a great contact. We’d had a conversation online, and we seemed to be in the same industry, albeit working in a different area.
I enjoyed our conversation, added her as a contact on my social media and then went about my day.
We’d been helping each other out a little… I’d read some of her posts and commented on them, and vice versa. It seemed to be a good arrangement, and lucky for her, there was quite a conversation happening on one of her posts about language.
I contributed to the conversation, another lady contributed, and so on. I mean, that’s how it works, right?
The next day, the author indicated she wanted to continue the conversation around language, which I was happy to do, because it really is such an important subject. She mentioned that she’d had two experiences that week. One where she’d been called “Girl” and another where someone had called her “Petal”.
She went on to explain that the feeling she had around “girl”, even though she knew that it was said from a place of love and with the meaning of sisterhood, made her feel like a lesser version. She said she felt more powerful than this and didn’t care to be addressed like that.
That’s when I went – Uh -Oh! See I was the one who called her “Girl”, totally from my heart space and totally from that sacred sister hood zone.
Interestingly enough, I felt a trigger over this, because it’s not the first time I’ve had someone quip me about my use of certain “terms of endearment”.
My take on it is this… I’ve called people “Dahl”, which is going to happen to you regularly if you live in Queensland, Australia… and I’ve had people get offended.
I call people “honey”, “hon” and “darling” and I’ve had people get offended. I’ve even been known to call someone sweetheart.
Lordy, that was not fun. LOL
To me, they are all terms of endearment. They come from a place of pure love, and from my heart space, and the intention is pure. If I refer to you as “Girl”, “Babe” “Hon” or anything else, it’s because I value you, I respect you, and I am sending love to you. That’s it.
There is nothing I can do about it, if someone else chooses to perceive this as something different. I am only responsible for my actions and reactions.
I am fully aware that I was triggered by this the other day. I am also fully aware that I am writing this story, because I am still a little triggered by it, and that’s ok. Awareness is the first step to healing.
What I am blown away by… is this. That people, who seem to be well educated, aware and even call themselves psychotherapists, would even have any kind of charge on any of these words being used at all. Especially to the point where they felt the need to be totally passive aggressive in their rejection of them.
Then when further discussion took place, as they asked, and you pointed out some things, they dismissed it all and said they had no more energy to give it.
See, here’s the thing. I’ve learned, that when something “triggers” me, that’s my internal warning system to look closer at why that is so. That’s because I know I am completely responsible for all of my actions and my reactions, and that no one can “make” me feel anything I don’t want to feel
So that basically means, that I am in control of the ship, and if there’s anything going on, like a rogue iceberg that could cause me grief, it’s up to me to steer myself or heal myself away from that.
For someone so educated, the fact that this person allows anyone’s opinions, or words for that matter affect them in such a way, astounds me.
That’s why I say we really need to get over ourselves. So, if anything like this triggers you, instead of reacting the way you normally do, why not do some internal investigating to find out why?
If you can’t do that on your own, then reach out to a qualified NLP practitioner like myself, and we’ll help you work it out.
For the record, I used to get really upset when people called me “Doll”. I know right? That was until I realised that it was just who they were, and that they meant it in a good way, and so I decided to get over myself and accept people for who they are.