The Stench of the Spew

How do you spew?

It’s a disgusting word, isn’t it? But we all do it.

Some of us let it accumulate inside. We take it in. We get annoyed. We almost say something, but we don’t. We rationalize we wouldn’t be able to express ourselves appropriately, so we don’t say something. Perhaps someone’s admonition of “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all” is seared into our memory. We might keep the build up in a category, or so we think, and it primarily builds at work or at home. But perhaps we don’t release it at all either place, so it continues to sit inside with new bits and pieces piling on every day, building the weight we might become accustomed to and excuse as “just the way it is.”

At some point, we can’t hold it any longer. We might say the wrong person said the wrong thing at the wrong time, but what about all the choices we made along the way in how we handled the bits and pieces? It might be the person we spew on has very little to do with what we bottled up. But we let it go, and it’s out of control. Even if others don’t experience the full brunt of it, we know better. We know the emotion behind it. And it leaves an awful aftertaste, perhaps both for ourselves and the other people involved.

Others tend to spew inwardly. The same things build and build, but when they are release, it’s the spewer who gets the full brunt. It turns inward in self-destruction, harshness, depression, anxiety, resentment, anger, and so on. It’s destructive.

Either approach is destructive to both ourselves and others. Neither approach is healthy.

We need to filter as we go. What should we allow to stay inside us? What do we need to gather more information about? What are we hanging onto for the wrong reasons? What coping strategies do we need to develop? What conversations do we need to have? How can we be appropriately honest with ourselves and others?

Until we’re willing to do so, until we’re ready to authentically reflect and process, we’re going to stink at spewing.