From an Eleven Year Old

I handed my 11 year old cousin, Cole, my Olympus film Camera.
"Yeah, Cole go ahead take a photo," I said as I showed him how to focus his view. He then ran after his aunt, and brought the camera back, laughing and said,
" I TOOK like SIX pictures!" I called him a terd and he then followed my harsh words with a witty,
"You can delete them, can't you?"
"No, Cole, no I cannot."

Later Cole and I sat the dining table grubbing on our Thanksgiving feast. Cole is pretty darn smart and sometimes the words that come out of his mouth make me spray cranberry sauce out of my nose; he is a born comedian. He turned to me as we were finishing our meal and said, out of the great wide blue,
"Liz, you are like a Swiss army knife."
WHAT ON EARTH IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN??? I gave myself about a milli-second of thought to what he may have meant and I almost regretted the next words to come out of my own mouth,
"What do you mean, Cole?"
"I mean you do one amazing thing, and then another amazing thing, and then another and another. You are a Swiss army knife, amazing."
For months I have been wanting to write a well thought out blog post on words and how they affect a person. Words can either negate or uplift and I do believe they have a great power in this world and in our hearts.
I woke up today feeling not so hot. I did not feel pretty, I did not feel nice, I did not feel self-less, I did not feel full of praise, nor did I feel worthy. I did not feel like going on a run, or eating turkey with my family. I woke up today not feeling like much at all.
And then my cousin took my camera and figured out to advance film and subsequently took a bunch of photos... I was an inch close to clobbering the little sneak. And then the little terd came to me with some sweetness.

It is like my cousin discerned years and years of self-deprecating thoughts and decided to shoot those thoughts dead. He really has no idea that I often feel small and worthless, he just acted upon goodness of character and his funny wit. He probably has no idea that he made my day, or rather my month with the words that came out of his young mouth.

In Proverbs 12:18 God tells us straight up,

"The words of the reckless pierce like swords, but the tongue of the wise brings healing. "

I challenge you and myself, because we all know I am not a pro at a life-giving words, give health to another today. It is SO vital for community to uplift and encourage one another. We do enough self-hurt to ourselves we do not need others to heap it on as well.