Words Matter

A couple of weeks ago, I said something during a public meeting that stirred up more reaction than I expected.

I was talking about being a school board member and not always knowing what questions to ask.

Some people understood exactly what I meant. A few people even talked with me days and weeks later and said, Yes. That’s real.

Others heard something entirely different.

They applied it in ways that carried their own history, frustration, and interpretation.

That’s the thing about words.

I’ve been a communicator long enough to know they don’t land the same for everyone.

What we mean and what is heard are not always identical. And when a single sentence spoken in a public meeting can stir that much emotion, it’s worth asking:

What happens when words are repeated regularly, intentionally, over time?

What do they build?

What do they train us to believe?

What do they anchor inside us?

I woke up thinking about this.

And about my experience with a man who is an expert in communication and persuasion. Someone who understands, deeply, that words matter.

He built a world for me.

And he decorated it with language.

Early on, he told me his goals were to keep me safe, warm, cherished — and someday loved.

He said, “I want you to trust me.”

He described himself as consistent. A caretaker. I’m not going anywhere.

These weren’t throwaway lines.

They were repeated.

Reinforced.

Ritualized.

Late at night, while we were in bed, while he was holding me, he would ask:

“Do you feel safe?”

“Do you feel warm?”

“Do you feel loved?”

Once our bond was formed, he asked those questions almost every night we were together.

Including the last time.

Words matter.

When I told my sister what he had said to me — about keeping me safe, warm, cherished, and someday loved — she said, “Those are the exact words you needed to hear.”

She wasn’t wrong.

More than anything, I needed to know I was safe.

That I would not be rejected.

That I would not be abandoned.

That someone meant what they said.

I felt lucky. Chosen. Protected.

Like I had been handed something divine.

I will never forget what one of his other women said about him:

“He has a way with words that manipulates emotions.”

Yes. He does.

Words matter.

Because words don’t just describe reality.

They create attachment.

They create expectation.

They create trust.

And when those words are not aligned with behavior, they don’t just fall flat.

They fracture.

What if he had never used those words with me?

Not the easy ones.

Not “love.”

That word is cheap and portable.

But safety.

Trust.

Consistency.

Integrity.

What if he had never wrapped me in language that mimicked security?

Would I have bonded the same way?

Would my nervous system have attached as deeply?

Would I have believed as completely?

Words matter.

In public leadership.

In private relationships.

In the quiet spaces where we let our guard down.

Because when someone uses the right words long enough, especially the ones that reach into old wounds, those words don’t just echo.

They embed.

Sometimes I wonder:

What if he had been honest?

What if instead of promising safety, he had told the truth about himself and what he truly wanted?

What if instead of rehearsing words about consistency, he had admitted he could not offer it?

What if he had told me the rules in advance and I had had true agency?

But that isn't the story we lived.

And words matter.