AUGUST : BLEEPS

In August, I abstained from BLEEPS. 

Cursing.

Cussing.

Profanity.

Expletives.

Bad Words.

Potty Mouth.

Obscenities.

Foul Language.

Unwholesome Talk.

All that. I gave it up. It was hard as hell, but not how you might think. 

The challenge was to avoid using profanity, of course, but I also wanted to abstain from outsized exclamations. See, I have a bad habit of overreacting to little things out loud in such a way that people around me think there is an actual emergency. For example, if I drop my pen, I might burst out “DANGIT!”. Total overkill. 

It can be embarrassing.

This used to drive my old boss up the wall. It was just the two of us in a tiny office for a while. We were a tech startup, so it was an emotional rollercoaster of ups and downs. Anything could happen any day. I’d be at my computer and suddenly burst out, “OH NO! AW MAN,” and he’d say, “Oh no… what happened?” He’s thinking our site went down or I found a critical bug in the app. I’d say, “…this t-shirt I want is out of stock in my size…”. And he’d say, “YOU CAN’T DO THAT TO ME”. 

Now multiply that by a thousand and you get what

Anna has had to deal with for the last 20 years. 

For this abstinence, I wanted to control that impulse and catch the words before they made it out of my mouth. At one point, I decided to try and react by naming the emotion I felt, out loud, but in a calm, proportional voice. So, if I forget something, I'd say, “slight disappointment in myself”.  Or a project wouldn’t be going the way I want and I’d say, “increasing frustration”, (which immediately diffused the frustration). This practice didn’t last long, partially because it was hilarious, and partially because 90% of the time I would end up saying, “mild impatience,” because so many of my outbursts had to do with the slightest, most petty interruptions. Effective, but humbling. 

Compared to that, abstaining from saying swear words aloud was easy peasy.

Honestly, I don’t swear all that much (out loud). People who know me, my friends, and people I’ve worked with for years, will say they’ve rarely heard me cuss. I spend a lot of time thinking about the impact and outcomes of the words I use. There are a few words on “the list” that I will sprinkle in from time to time, but I’m careful with them. For many years, from my teens into adulthood, I truly did try to avoid using common curse words. I could check that box and say I kept my mouth clean. 

The Bible has a lot to say about the tongue, the mouth, evil speech, etc. The tongue is a fire… a small rudder that steers a big ship… what comes out of your mouth is what defiles you… and so on. As I’ve gotten older, those verses have become all the more true, but less about the actual words. When Jesus says, “But I say to you that anyone who is angry with his brother… and says, ‘Raca!’ will be liable to the hell of fire,” people sometimes misinterpret it and think that getting angry is a sin or will result in judgment. I don’t think that is the point. It’s the state of the heart that gets you in trouble, not the emotion or the word. The word “Raca”, often translated as “fool”, also means “idiot” or “empty-headed.” It can also infer a deeper, more insidious meaning, “I think you are less than human, less than the singular, unique creation that you are,” or, at its worst, “you are worthless.”  The word itself is not good, but it is not an unspeakable expletive. The problem isn’t the word… it’s the intent. It’s the heart behind the speech. 

That teaching resonated with me. My takeaway was not so much, “watch your mouth,” but “watch your heart.” 

You hear so many surrogate swear words when people are trying to “watch their mouth”, but they aren’t always shooting blanks. Those words can pack heat, whether they’re “bad words” or not. I know I’ve said, “...that dang so-and-so…”, but deep down I know it means something more sinister. I can pack a lot of vitriol into almost any word I want. Your heart knows if your darn is a damn, or if your shoot is a shit. Sometimes we fool others, sometimes we fool ourselves. I’ve loosened my grip on the words I will or will not use, but I think I’ve become more aware of the weight of the words. 

I genuinely try not to speak evil towards or about people. That feels like “cursing”, like placing a curse or wishing ill will on someone else. I will absolutely spit fire at an inanimate object if it doesn’t do what it's supposed to...

If you’re trying to abstain from swearing,

let me advise you that fly fishing is not a good idea.

I will swear at myself, but I rarely curse at other people. I believe there is a real danger in dehumanizing people with words. 

I generally don’t like using textbook profanity to get my point across, though. I often think swearing is the easy way out. It’s lazy. Those sharp words become dull with use. I use them sparingly, though, so they keep their edge. I also think it’s sorta fun to swear in other languages. One day, when my son was in middle school, he heard me say “scheisse,” which has long been a favorite surrogate swear word. He looked at me and said, “Dad, it’s still a swear word when you say it in German.” 

Busted.

It was equally funny and true. I had been fooling myself to think it was a surrogate at all. It would have been more honest of me to just swear in English. I just think it sounds better, though.

And anyway, how did he know how to say “shit” in German? 

Learning another language helped me understand swearing from a different perspective. When I moved to Costa Rica, I was working for a small inner-city church, living with a God-fearing church widow, splitting my days between working with Christians in the bindery, serving lunches at a senior center, and guiding/translating on short mission trips. When I arrived, my Spanish was rudimentary…

…emphasis on rude. 

I had taken two years of Spanish in high school, but that had been years ago. Every day, I’d be listening so intently to pick up as much as I could. I’d collect words in a little book and ask a ton of questions. I started to pick up on some words that sounded familiar but sounded… off. They turned out to be some of those surrogate swear words that the Christians were using in place of “real” bad words. Honestly… it was confusing. I’d have to discern the severity of the surrogate or the presence of an actual swear word based on the reactions of the other hearers. I’d also hear the pastor cussing at the pulpit. That was a surprise. I’d hear him say words that I knew for a fact were on the naughty list. Even as a white kid from the middle of America, I knew a few swear words in Spanish, and he was certainly using some of those words.

A few months into my time living there, I went camping on the beach with a couple of Costa Rican friends. Once we were beyond earshot of anyone, I said, “Tell me everything”. I wanted them to teach me every single expletive, slang word, ugly turn-of-phrase, and ear-splitting innuendo.

And they did. It took days.

The experience was revelatory. So many things started to make sense. I’d been hearing all the fake versions of these words and phrases for weeks, but now I understood the root words. 

They explained why the pastor was swearing, too. It turns out that some words mean different things in different Latin countries. In Mexico, pendejo meant something like “asshole”, but in Costa Rica, it meant something more like, “idiot” or “coward”. It was so interesting to me that the same word could be heard in such different ways. 

Fast forward a year or two, and I’m working at the bike shop. A mother and her son bring in his little bike with a bent rim. They only spoke Spanish, so I said, in Spanish, “Your wheel is bent beyond repair.” What they heard, though, was...

“Your wheel is totally F%!&ED.”

The look on the kid’s face told me I said something I shouldn’t have said. It turns out the word I learned in Costa Rica for “bent” or “crooked” meant something very different in Mexico. Thankfully, the kind woman gave me a kinder word to use in the future.

A tangent to my tangent - The gesture we use in the states for “Got your nose!”, when you put your thumb between your fingers in a fist? That means something very, very different in Costa Rica. Very different. I do not recommend using that joke and gesture in Sunday School in Costa Rica.

Bad idea. 

Ok, back to the story. 

After a few days on the beach, I returned to the city with a decent sunburn and a deepened lexicon. Now I could catch things being said around me and respond in turn. It was especially effective with the piratas (cab drivers), who would often speak down to me or try to take advantage of me since I was a white kid living where no white people go. I could spit back a pseudo-swear or, if the situation called for it, a fully loaded expletive, and they’d be shocked or impressed. I also found myself laughing at jokes that people around me didn’t expect me to get. Sometimes that got me in trouble. 

The lesson showed me that the words we use can have different meanings to different people in different places and reiterated that the intent bears as much meaning as the words themselves. It’s still a good idea to watch your mouth, though. 

So - abstaining from outbursts was one part of the challenge. Abstaining from saying bad words out loud, was another. The hardest part of this abstinence, by far, was controlling the curses that never get said and curbing the despicable language I use towards myself. 

I confess… I have a vile vocabulary reserved for my inner monologue. Negative self-talk is a deep fault. I regularly ride the slippery slope from self-effacing to self-deprecating all the way down to self-denigration. This month’s abstinence laid bare this bad habit. So often, I’d mouth a caustic missile aimed at myself and then stop to marvel at both the speed and severity of the insult. This was the hardest part of the month; Not only controlling the impulse, but recognizing the frequency and foulness of my negative self-talk. 

I can’t believe you would admit this on this blog, you jackass.

You better watch your mouth or people are going to think you’re a lunatic.

See? That’s what I mean. I don’t have to do that. I’m not crazy. I imagine a lot of people could benefit from being more benevolent with themselves. I realized I needed to wash out my monologue and be more gracious with myself. One of my favorite lyrics from IDLES is in the song, Television: “If someone talked to you, the way you do to you, I’d put their teeth through… love yourself.” I need to work on scrapping the words that don’t belong up there and cut myself some slack. I think I’ll be better off. 

You’re probably right. I’m not being helpful. I’m sorry. 

I’m sorry, too. 

Watch your heart. 

Watch your heart. 

Right. 

I never would have guessed that a month without profanity would have made me think so much about grace. 

Hallelujah, goshdarnit. 

Amen.