“A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.”

Abraham Lincoln

It’s simple but true, right?

For the last few weeks, I’ve been reading though How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. It’s a book full of wisdom in handling people, and I’ve been learning a lot while going through it. When I saw Lincoln’s quote in there, I knew I had to share it.

Naturally, I think our reaction to negative situations is to respond in a negative manner. As Woodrow Wilson said, “If you come at me with your fists doubled, I think I can promise you that mine will double as fast as yours”.

Often, our first reactions are the wrong reactions. If someone says something unkind or acts unfair to me in some way, my automatic reaction is to give them a taste of their own medicine in an even larger dose. We all know how that works, right? And what happens next? Obviously the other person gets hurt by what I said and doubles that insult. In such a case, the only person who wins the match is the person who said the nastiest words the loudest and longest.

A drop of honey, however, has an opposite effect. Now, I’m not saying everyone will immediately apologize to you and kiss your feet if you throw something nice back at their bitter words, but kindness softens people. It does! In truth, a kind word, a smile, or a “drop of honey” will likely carry you farther down the road than if you were hobbling on the stick of yelling the loudest, grumbling the most, and all other sorts of “gall”.

It’s hard to be the one to show kindness in a situation where gall comes by the gallons; but I challenge you (and myself) today to think twice before speaking in an unpleasant manner, to be the drop of honey, and ultimately to show the love of Christ to those around us in doing that.

Kailey