Count to Ten

I always tell my music students, "Don't stop to fix your mistakes. Once they're out, they're out."
Yes, once a sound is 'out there" it can't be retrieved and stuck back inside your throat or the bowels of the piano or other musical instrument. The audience has heard the wrong note; you cannot pluck that back from their brains.
What's done is done.
Better never to have made the mistake at all. And so, my music student and I go back to the musical manuscript and work on the spot that is causing the performance mishap.

Isn't that just like our spoken words? It's so easy to let them pass through our lips, but once out, impossible to un-say them.
It's happened to me: words that have penetrated my ears and poured searing hurt right down onto my heart. And I, in turn, have dipped my verbal arrows in poison and sent them flying.
So much better to have restrained my tongue.
Wouldn't it be great if we had a "backspace" or "undo" tab that we could click each time we fail to stop our wounding words?
The problem with hurtful words is they always come back to hurt the speaker. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, but sometime. Maybe the result is a relationship that isn't as open or loving or trusting.
You remember that old admonishment: "count to ten when you're angry."
I''ve decided to do that. I've noticed that when I get to ten, it gets way easier to keep the bad words from slipping out.

"He who guard his mouth and his tongue keeps himself from calamity." (Proverbs 21:23)