Gossiping Geese

Ok, so the title was just to get your attention - I didn't stumble across a news feature about geese that like to gossip. Humans on the other hand  - oh my life! In the days of yore, when I was at school, I read a magazine article that said 'Gossiping is good for you'. I remember thinking, 'Wahey! I can talk about people and not only will I feel good, but I will be slim and healthy too and maybe pick up a boyfriend and grow longer legs.' 

I also remember, whilst talking about the flaws and foes of my friends, experiencing a little prickly feeling - it was uncomfortable and like a nagging headache that kept coming back except it was anchored in my heart and my stomach. I finally realized that the feeling was my conscience - my higher self  - and whilst the glossy magazine told me one thing, I knew the opposite was true. I became a Baha'i (look to this website if you want to find out the wheres, whys and whos about this faith  - www.bahai.org) at the tender age of 16 and I looked to the writings to see if there was any thing on backbiting. There was and it made my head spin! Backbiting was likened to murder. 

The 'me' that was aged 16 didn't understand how that could be. But over the years that followed, I was to see how through the mere act of talking about another person, with or without malicious intent, could make a community turn against each other, could enable people to live in fear and distrust,  could bring one single person crumbling to their knees, desperate for a new life to be built around them because the one life they new and lived for had been stripped away through just plain old speech. 

Simple fact that I have learned - lives can be ruined by backbiting. If we take this to the extreme - where celebrities are talked about incessantly in the tabloids - lots of things true, many things fabricated and completely false - the furore has in some cases been too much and the person has taken their life or numbed themselves with drugs and alcohol.

I used to have various Saturday jobs and in one particular clothing store, everyone would sit in the staff-room at lunchtime -  topic of conversation being the only person who wasn't in the room. I would sit there listening to how such and such was a terrible person because they did this, that and the other, then someone else would leave the room. Then the attention would be focused towards them instead. Every time someone got up to leave, the rest of the group would talk about them. No one was safe. I remember thinking, 'I am never going to leave this room!' I also wanted the conversations to stop - but I didn't know how to say the right words, or even know how to remove myself from the situation. I was almost frozen with what might happen if I joined in - what might happen if I walked away. I was only new - how could I stand up for these people? If what was being said was even true, was it just and reasonable to talk about their faults? Did everyone have the right to do this? Is gossiping good for you?

I have since read various articles which continually strive to prove that talking about others is ok. But is it ever ok? When should you draw the line? Is it ok to even say good things behind people's backs? For example, someone is pregnant, but they specifically didn't want anyone to know. But you share the good news with several people anyway - and then the person finds out. How do they react? Do they have the right to react that way - it was only good news after all?

What I have found as each year goes by, as I relax into me being me, I see people talking about each other as a way to fill time, or as a means to make them feel, look or just act greater than others. It's an empty form of conversation for me, to talk idly about others - but I can see how it's so very easy to do and slip into this way of being. BUT! Does backbiting bring good health? Does it bring happiness? Is there anything positive about talking about others? Are we damaging our own selves, our souls, if we speak foul of people instead of letting our lips drip with honey, diamonds and jewels?

What do you think of the quote below? Have a read and do post your thoughts, views and experiences on the subject.

If the fire of self overcome you, remember your own faults and not the faults of My creatures, inasmuch as everyone of you knoweth his own self better than he knoweth others. (Baha'u'llah)

I as an individual can only strive to be a better person each day - but to also question what we have in front of us. Will it do? Can we change it?