The Dangers of Cussing

We've all done it, for one reason or another. We use swear words as kids and even more as adults until we come to the realization that swearing is something that tends to invoke the negative side of our personality, others personalities, and often is deeply associated with the worst times in our lives.

Some people seem to cuss when they are happy, doing well, and their emotions are at an all time high, but one thing you will notice between those that cuss when things are good (or just in general lace them in) and those that cuss when things are bad- is the difference in formatting the inflections, where the end of the word/sentence lands, and is emphasized.

When your upset you tend to put a great deal of emphasis on the cuss words- you power it with intense emotions. When you're happy the words come out more, for lack of a better term, cheerful. You can usually tell when someone is cussing angrily and when they are overwhelmed with emotion or one from a happy event.

Just out of curiosity when studying language and the vibrations of words and how they affect people physically (sound is actually a physical happenstance), emotionally (associations with events that reinforce and heighten the reaction), and reactively (bad filters that put people on edge when they hear them to the point of disgust and triggering anger) I did some research into this "bad" tradition of cussing. I wanted to know more and this article covers what I found.

Who writes this stuff??? The most ridiculous thing I've ever heard is the thing many people tell their children to say "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me". Words can cause more damage than any sticks AND stones combined.

Words have the power to do agony, to inflict and trigger rage, to make you go out of your mind, to start (or finish) a fight and much more! Words can now travel at the speed of light (internet/cell phones, etc...) and inflict someone from the other side of the world without you even speaking them aloud- even typewritten words are powerful.

I'd say words read vs. being heard are more dangerous because they are perceived without the benefit of body language, inflection, or even any clues to the person's actual intent. 80% of someone's actual language in a conversation is body language so realistically, reading an email is void of 80% of the actual contents, clues, and visual cues that tell you what they are "actually" trying to say and how.

Sticks and stones, they only hurt you at close range, but words can abolish your common sense, your patience, and the very thing keeping your sanity in check- your mind!

It make's sense that some vibrations are foul, damaging, and down right evil to our mood. The effects of cuss words power is truly, actually, relative.

I suspect the vibrations, just based on the way most people cuss at high volume and with intense emotion, can cause more than just a person to feel it- plants, animals, and any living creatures feel vibrations and are affected by them. This is why a "room" feels one way or another. Emotions and words are said to leave a lasting "imprint" into the atmosphere of where they are created/expelled!

I believe our words but mainly the way we "shape" them through emotion, intent, and the very way we focus our attention (i.e. yelling in the air or at someone), can actually encode the vibrations themselves and can be either contaminating or contributing to any situation, relationship, or conversation.

The reality of this is that words can do much more damage than sticks and stones ever could. An example is that you can run from sticks and stones, people wielding them to hurt you perhaps, but words can be shouted out from any distance and, if heard, penetrate all your security systems in place (i.e. you can't not hear it if it's by surprise) and can violate your very sense of well being.

_____________________________________________________________________________

On the other side of the fence there is the good vibrations and associations that words cause and equally as powerful are the (positive) repercussions of using them. Most of us know the power of good words/vibrations/associations but many have no clue about the repercussions of bad words (other than yelling them at the wrong person will validate that sticks and stones can in fact break my bones).

Cuss words in particular tend to trigger everybody in some way. Depending on your experiences, your associations to the words, and your social consciousnesses about them- they will affect you differently. To one person cuss words are just everyday life _{(like a truck driver? my mom used to say because my uncle the truck driver was ALWAYS cussing as if it were the bulk of his vocabulary)} because they've re-associated their meaning from negative to "venting" which in turn can (if enough people around you accept it without prejudice) become words like any other. It takes some severe control over your emotions to cuss and not offend, but even if you say them in the nicest way- the associations others have to the words or their disdain in the first place will not change anything. People who cuss a lot are simply not very fun to be around. These words have been branded and associated to dirty, and for the most part for GOOD reason.

_____________________________________________________________________________

Just hearing the "B" word is like unlocking a monster inside many people. They can't even choose to stop. An example is some women call one another B*****s, but if a male were to try that (with any inflection at all), he better have his cross trainer running Nike's on.

What's a bit mind blowing is that the words themselves carry NO negative vibrations in and of themselves.

They are like virus transporters in a way or a "carrier signal" of intent (perceived or otherwise by you or the receiving party). Some viruses are tiny and get into your computer with the only job being to network already present resources to "create" a virus from your own software and infect you using a script built into the primer virus. This is a bit how cussing works. It contains but a short word but attached to it is emotion, intention, and the script and resources, however, are present in you already- it just has to trigger it.

_____________________________________________________________________________

If you somehow landed on an alien planet that spoke English and didn't use ANY cuss words, didn't have ANY words of the like, and started rambling on sentences in pure cuss words (without inflecting them or showing negative body language) they wouldn't hurt a fly.

The words themselves, that is, wouldn't hurt a fly. The emotions, the body language you network as a result of expressing them- even to an alien- would be offensive or not (depending on how you said it, what body language you use etc...).

It's the human psychology, the way we've come to know words and especially cuss words, that affect us- not the word itself. Some people are not at all offended by any cuss words, possibly because they hear them all the time and mainly not used for negativity but rather a sort of "click" thing.

They likely have no or not enough to matter, negative associations with them other than learning to say them based on emotional reaction they are basically mimicking.

When you realize that the full power cuss words have over you is purely "in the cloud" of your mind, experiences, and collectively associations that created filters in your thinking/boundaries, you can stop their impact on you with a little bit of work to reprogram your thinking. When you purposely want to change how any cuss word impacts you you can do it. When someone cusses you have to redirect your thinking using "re-framing".

_____________________________________________________________________________

Re-Framing

Re-framing is the act of redefining a thought stream or way of thinking and is as simple as practicing a new definition for it in your head. When someone yell's a cuss word that offends you stop, tell your brain not to react normally, and insert a new reaction. After you practice this it will become automatic thus changing your pattern. Cuss words are not the only words affected this way- they are just the ones that are the most universally accepted as "bad" or "negative". ANY word can become a "cuss-trigger" so to speak. If you build up all kinds of associations to even the word "Love", and never really felt or experienced the positive side of the word it could in effect become a cuss word to you.

Many religions believe that certain words, rather sounds of letters in those words create a sort of harmony (or disharmony) in the body and environment. This is the basis of magic spells, although most of the poetic natures of spells are timing, the very sounds being emanated by those words in the lyrics create a series of vibrations. These vibrations affect us, affect others, and create causes that later manifest as effects, effects we then react to (new causes) and it continues long after the original words were spoken.

_____________________________________________________________________________

In magic or spells everything used in the spell from candles, seasonings, objects, smoke, water, etc... all are supposed to be based on harmonic interaction of elements. In other words the color of the candle puts off one vibration, the light of the wick burning (flame) is another vibration and includes sound and objects invoke specific emotions in people, and so on.

Networked all these things are supposed to create a focus and heighten your intent to the point where you manifest whatever the spell is supposed to evoke. It's not magic so much as using various things to provoke you and motivate you to think in a certain way that causes your micro-movements to over time manifest things you want into being by actions you take, even those you take and don't know why.

I mention this not to go off topic but to illustrate how cuss words can also do the same thing but in a more instantaneous way, because most people ALREADY have enough information, experiences, and the like, inside their minds so curse words tend to do what spells do but in fast forward motion. I'd have to say that curse/cuss words are the modern day version of an instant spell that can turn one person into a monster, another into a frustrated being, another it may not affect at all, and yet another may simply find it offensive and walk away angry, building negative associations to the person who spoke it (picture someone walking into a bank and cussing out the teller- you'd be unnerved by this person wouldn't you?).

_____________________________________________________________________________

The only other term that comes to mind that is just as powerful over the largest cross section of people in the world, but in a positive way (for most) is "Love".

I think many men are afraid to say "I Love You" because they realize somewhere inside this will invoke a spell that will require them to be a certain way or they will have to commit to a relationship. Some feel it enslaves them or takes the relationship to another level they aren't comfortable with. Either way- it's power is either exhilarating or scary, or for some, just benign.

No other words can you walk into a crowded room full of polite people and yell will give you an almost uniform reaction (even though every person has a different reason and set of associations that make them get angry when they hear it).

I've read many books that go into much more detail about the vibration of cuss words, but the bottom line is that cuss words often (due to emotion and factors mentioned above) tend to carry an intense and negative vibration and the very act of thinking them let along speaking them (a thousand times more powerful) can cause bad things to happen.

I say thinking them because in the same way they afflict others by creating chain reactions of negative associations to surface thus changing someone's mood, chemical balance, and more... this ALSO happens in you JUST thinking the word with any intensity.

Again, if you've gained full control over your thoughts, taking inventory often and sculpting the way you think as not to just react before you think- this may not affect you.

How you use them also gives them meaning which puts that "vibration" into motion with a "purpose". Writing them down, thinking them, then reading it aloud is a recipe for disaster. 

Let's go into the second phase of Curse words (I prefer to call them curse words to remind me of their true nature)- Association.

_____________________________________________________________________________

If you think about it, everything you see, hear, feel, taste, smell, in life is based solely on your interpretation of that sensory information. Words are a way for us to quantify in a tangible way what we're feeling, how we think, what we see, and how we experience life. Everything we remember is stored not as raw data, but based on our interpretation of that data when compared to and associated with something we already know. In other words if you didn't know anything then all new stimulus would be incomprehensible to us- we'd have no way to quantify it and understand it.

We even build reactions based on these associations. This is where cursing seems to be uniformly accepted as negative. I don't know about you but I rarely cuss at all but when I do it's when I'm angry, perturbed, upset, or frustrated.

The law of association is king in our ability to experience our world and comprehend it as well. That said, every word, every thought, every sense converted into perceptions or decoded through perceptions is only understood because of some counter association it's connected to. This means when we say the word "Love" our interpretation of the word's meaning to us, is powered by all the things surrounding that word.

Every lesson, every relationship, every hurt feeling, every thexual (word omitted) feeling, every person we've ever "loved" or cared about and so on is based on a network of associations that manifested that experience/emotion as an end result of a complex associative concept in your mind based on stimulus. Words are incredibly powerful because they are not just a word, they're an entire realm of associations we cannot escape if we tried because they are often reactive not active feelings (unless you painstakingly re-frame every association or by some miracle can figure out the "root" association that acts as the roots to maintaining that thought stream (association network leading to a specific result)).

Let's take some powerful words that generally conjure up powerful emotions based on the bazillion associations connected to them. I'm sure we can all come up with more than 100 deeply scaring words that when heard are incredibly offensive such as racial slurs, curse words, de-motivational words "you suck" "loser" and so on.

The power behind these words are that they can instantly and with great force affect our emotions, our actions, and even our biology "blood boiling" is not just something people say in jest, you literally 'feel' like your blood is boiling when certain emotions take you over.

Realistically this is a chemical reaction in the body when Adrenalin and other chemicals are released by the brain when the "fight" part of fight or flight is initiated. Your body does heat up and you feel a uniform heat in your body thus why people feel like their blood is boiling.

The scary part is that most people have not learned to control their reactions to certain words. Can someone yell to your face a bunch of obscenities without it affecting you in any way? Not likely. Is it possible to learn to be non reactive to ANY word? Absolutely.

______________________________________________________________

We all have insecurities and those insecurities are associated often with one or more words that can "trigger" us. Being called a "loser" evokes feelings of inadequacy.

Why? Because we've all felt like a loser at some point in our lives- it's the fail to success format of life that makes this happen.

We eventually learn that we're not a loser we're just "in training" for something, but none the less the association is still there and like a "sleeper cell" waits for the right associations to happen or even a single word (like "loser") aimed at you and all hell breaks loose in your brain (which has counter effects in the body like adrenalin).

One of the hallmarks of working retail is that as bad as it often is, we tend to learn self control over words, over our actions, and how we perceive things.

Rationalization can be used as a weapon against word terror, and I often will size up who's doing the talking before I even begin to allow their words to affect me in ANY way. If you think your a loser and someone calls you a loser, it is their credibility to be right, or your strong belief that your a loser (or associated fear of becoming a loser) that will ultimately make it true (to you). It's not, of course, but that doesn't matter.

______________________________________________________________

Eleanor Roosevelt said something very powerful that to this day impacts my thinking:

"nobody can make you feel anything without your consent".

______________________________________________________________

This is absolutely true. It means essentially that if you don't allow them to, they can't. Words can penetrate your psyche in a billionth of a second and every association that defines that word will instantly hit you, causing you to "lose your cool". This is a firing of neurons in sync based on the many connections between your experiences, beliefs, and fortified beliefs that cause you to react without thinking. Learning to not react but to really take in ALL the information (the words, the person saying them, their "true" intention (and your not allowing them to sway your thinking), and more, will do a great deal for your ability to "sustain a hit" without injury.

At a subconscious level we're actually experiencing our stress external from our physical body as a wake of vibrations inside/outside us are formed by the words and thoughts of this word and it's definitive associations. We perceive this change in "atmosphere" at the subconscious level and feel comforted because for a moment, our internal world and external world are in sync- as negative as this is, we feel a sense of balance.

They start out as just words, but over our lifetime become much more. We also notice others cussing in anger. Some people use cuss words when they are happy, and because they are in such an elevated state they don't notice any negative effects of doing so. If you're in a good enough mood your actually fortified from the instantaneous effects of curse words or words you yourself associate to negative things.

This isn't to say you can't be instantly floored by a word- but that often the very momentum of our good mood contains so many powerful and active (and recurring/consistently refreshed) associations that the negative one is like a drop of mud in the pool of your mind. At first it may not affect you so much other than some disgust, but if it continues its like pouring buckets of mud into the pool- each instance can double or triple the successive "dump" of mud into your minds pool and that starts to wake up more negative associations than positive and you lose it.

______________________________________________________________

If you like to try an experiment, try using the F word when your in a good mood. The first time won't shake you, but keep saying it again and again, even try smiling while you say it and say it about 20 times in a row. You will notice your mood shifts. You will start to feel like you don't like that word, you will start to feel your emotions stir up, and you will start to have negative memories pop into your head. All of these things will start a powerful chain reaction that will alter your good mood and make it harder to maintain it, if you even can.

In the physical plane you must counter the bad vibrations by throwing out positive ones. Say things that you know make you feel wonderful like "love". If you don't have negative associations with that word that can be the most powerful thing to say. You can even say it with qualifying statements like "I love my wife" and "I love my life". It's not about esoteric self help gibberish it's about the battle in your mind between "good" and "evil"- which ever has the most associations in tact at any given time rules your world.

You should be mindful of how words, not just curse words but all words, affect you. Pay attention to your emotions when you say things, you will be amazed how much you take for granted. Taking words for granted is something that can put you into a spiral. The monks don't speak for years but look how peaceful it makes them!

It's not just what you say, it's what you think. Just thinking the curse words "GD" can affect you, all be it not as powerful as actually saying it, the ripple effect is just as powerful, it just takes longer to hit you. (saying God D*** is like saying oh most powerful force in existence, please, damn ___. the line being whatever comes after you say GD, and if you don't say anything, the last thing you thought about will fill in the blank!). We may say these things not thinking there are any repercussions but keep in mind how much your brain actually knows about the literal translation of cuss words and make up your own mind.

Be mindful of what you will accept others around you to say. Others words can also affect you because once you hear them they become thoughts, and the vibrations they set into motion are also perceived by you. When your angry never curse, (because it's like road rage with words).

Words can hurt you, but they can also inspire, empower, and enrich yours and others lives. Choose your words like you choose your battles, because in the end, they are the same thing!

I'll conclude this with a word of advice from Linda Goodman in her book "Star Signs" (an amazing book!)- (I'm paraphrasing) "If you ever say a curse word that could "damn" you, you will send those vibrations into the universe and they will pick up speed and weight then return to kick you when you least expect it but simply saying with the same intensity and volume you used when you said the curse word: "I take that back"- you will cancel your "order" to the universe".

Good Luck!