IF YOU CAN’T PUSH THEM, DON’T PULL THEM

IF YOU CAN’T PUSH THEM, DON’T PULL THEM

Every one of us is a product of the words spoken to or against us. The word spoken to you might be aural- sound or voice; and visual – text, images, symbols and signs. The words spoken to you can make or mar your life. We all live by words. Word heals and kills. Word destroys and builds.  EVERY WORD IS POTENT AND POWERFUL. Your life is sharpened by the combination of alphabets that penetrate into your soul. EVERY WORD IS SPIRITUAL. The spiritual context of the word here is not about religion, but about the mystical and celestial nature that governs the word. In actual fact, words cannot be seen and touched; words can only be felt. Words deals with action, emotion, and reactions rather than the physical aspect of human being. The eyes and ears are connected to the heart where emotion is processed. What you read and hear penetrates to the heart. Your movement and progress in life can be delayed, retarded and barricaded by the intensity of the words you read or hear. Your progress can also be hastened, augmented and accelerated by the potency of the words you read or hear.<script async src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>
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Words are like a honed knife in the hand of a butcher;
a trowel and shovel in the hand of a bricklayer.
Words can tear down and can build up.
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How relieved would it be for a horse stringed to a heavily loaded cart, that later finds someone with a knife and cut it off against the cart? Or how painful would it be for the same horse with an empty cart, climbing a hill without stress, found someone who uses his shovel to load sand and unwanted content into the cart?
No matter how you pull people back, you will always form a queue behind them. As long as you want to be a burden to people, you will not rise beyond them.
Your words are strong enough to relieve people and cogent enough to be a burden for them. People are passing through insurmountable situations that need only a word from us to lift up their downtrodden spirit, but sometimes we clutch our hands like a weathered beating chicken, leaving them to their fate and thinking they do not deserve our encouragements or we ought to be officially summoned into their lives before any action could be taken. No man can survive on his own. Someone needs a trigger from you, but if you can’t push them, don’t pull them.
If you can’t build, don’t pull. If you can’t be a pillar of support,
don’t orchestrate a downfall. If you can’t encourage, don’t discourage.
Most of us have intentionally and subconsciously pulled people down and pushed people up through our words. Sometimes we do not know the gravity, feisty and intensity of our verbal and non-verbal words until it becomes a regret, scar, healing balm or appraisal. We might play prank with people and be amused with the way we talk, but some people are restored or destabilized as a result of what we utter from our mouth.

If the word you spoke appeared on your skin, would you still be beautiful? Anonymous

It is better to build people than to build mansions. Use your personality to build not to destroy.
There are many ways by which each one of us pull people down, hence, let me highlight six ways:
Seven Ways  you have pulled People Down

1. You have pulled people down because you do not want them to be where they are or you are not expecting them to be there so soon or late. Hence, you conceive gossip, hatred, rumour-cooking and parrot-like dissemination of character defamation in other to dissuade them and leave them scrabbling in darkness. If you can’t push them, don’t pull them.
2. You have pulled people down because they are not dancing to the rhythm of your belief, ideology, race, religion, hypothesis, and philosophy. You want people to dress like you, talk like you, eat like you, walk like you, move like you, understand like you, and cope like you. Therefore, when you don’t get from them the expected result, you arrange for their malaises and maladies. You are who you are and they are who they are. You can’t be them and they can’t be you. If you can’t push them, don’t pull them.
3.  You have pulled people down because you want their positions. People have used different strategies, tactics, modus operandi, and formulation to pull others down in order to acquire their desired position. IF GOD WANTS YOU THERE, HE WILL PUT YOU THERE. In every cadre, there are people who crave to occupying different positions, and if it seems their promotion is moving in a snail pace, they engineer crooked means to evict anybody intercepting their moves.  If you can’t push them, don’t pull them.
4. You have pulled people down because you do not have the opportunities they have. Just because your parents lives in a ghetto, they are in a  lower class or they did not have the wherewithal to buy luxurious cars, build desired buildings, use sophisticated gadgets and meet the expense of sending you to a more expensive institution, do not mean you should pull down with words, others whose parents can afford something better than your parents. In actual fact, it doesn’t make you better. If you can’t push them, don’t pull them. 
5. You have pulled people down because you want to see your handwritings in their life. People always want to be part and associate themselves with success stories. We want people to reference us when it is well with them and also want other people to know that we have contributed to their achievements. The fact that people refused to reference you, allow your influence to penetrate into them or they refused to make use of your seemingly good ideas does not mean you should start painting them black or reclining your arms at the door post anticipating their downfalls. Give people the liberty to make their choice and be who they want to be; if you can’t push them, don’t pull them.
6. You have pulled people down because they are not your tribe neither do they understand your language. If you can’t push them, don’t pull them.

7.    You have pulled people down because they do not have the opportunities you have – wealthy background, age, class, pedigree, parents, family and status in the society. Just because people are not where, we tend to cause more harm to their heart rather than lifting their spirit or leave them the way they are. The moment you are fortunate to know the root of their problem, you add extra salt to their bleeding scars. We pull them down by giving them silly, inauspicious and disheartening reasons why they are poor, dull, barren, unsuccessful, disabled, infirmed, and so on. If you can’t push them, don’t pull them .                

 words  are powerful and energetic force. Words are loaded guns; be careful of how, when, where, and why you pull the trigger. You words can build and can destroy. If you can’t push them, don’t pull them. You can make life easy for yourself and other people if only you know how to say the right and building words. Encourage people and do not weigh them down with your words.

Stephen AJAMU
astolt.astolt@gmail.com