Buddhist Ethics & Action Network

Wise Speech

Four Guidelines for Wise (or “Right”) Speech

  1. Truthfulness
  2. Helpfulness
  3. Kindness
  4. Clear Intention (including good timing, appropriateness, non-distractedness, etc.)

Questions

  1. How am I not entirely truthful? For example, to what extent are there outright lies, exaggerations, half-truths, or omissions?
  2. In which areas of my life is there most easily truthfulness? In which areas is truthfulness hardest or least present?
  3. When I speak more negatively, what is present in my mind and heart? What are the origins of instances of more harsh or malicious speech? How do I notice that there is harshness or maliciousness?
  4. What helps me to speak more helpfully or kindly?
  5. How do I get distracted? What helps me to have a clear intention in my speaking and listening?
  6. Which of the four guidelines do I most easily follow? Which is most difficult?
  7. What support do I need for developing further wise speech?

Practices

  1. Reflect on what areas of wise speech you particularly want to cultivate.
  2. Take a day or even a whole week and devote it to wise speech. You might even keep the four guidelines on a sheet of paper (or on your hand!). Take notes, if you wish, and at the end of the practice period, reflect on what you’ve discovered. (At the beginning, just observe; see what’s there, being careful to observe any self-judgments that arise.)
  3. Sometimes take a particular meeting or interaction and dedicate yourself to wise speech during a short period of an hour or two.
  4. Consider emphasizing the guideline that is most in need of development.
  5. See what particularly helps your cultivation of wise speech.
  6. For a day or a week, refrain from discussing any person who is not present as you are speaking, and observe how this changes the nature of your speech.

Quotations

A statement endowed with five factors is well-spoken, not ill-spoken. It is blameless and unfaulted by knowledgeable people. Which five?
It is spoken at the right time. It is spoken in truth. It is spoken affectionately. It is spoken beneficially. It is spoken with a mind of good-will. [AN V.198]

Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful speech and the inability to listen to others, I vow to cultivate loving speech and deep listening in order to bring joy and happiness to others and relieve others of their suffering. Knowing that words can create happiness or suffering, I vow to learn to speak truthfully, with words that inspire self-confidence, joy, and hope. I am determined not to spread news that I do not know to be certain and not to criticize or condemn things of which I am not sure. I will refrain from uttering words that can cause division or discord, or that can cause the family or the community to break. I will make all efforts to reconcile and resolve all conflicts, however small. [Thich Nhat Hanh, For A Future To Be Possible: Commentaries on the Five Wonderful Precepts, p. 44]

Our ability to offer empathy can allow us to stay vulnerable, defuse potential violence, help us hear the word “no” without taking it as a rejection, revive lifeless conversation, and even hear the feelings and needs expressed through silence. [Marshall Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life, p. 133]

When people feel fully heard, when they know they matter, they are more likely to be open to hearing from others [Miki Kashtan, “Responding to People in Power”]

And the deepest level of communication is not communication, but communion. It is wordless. It is beyond words, and it is beyond speech, and it is beyond concept. [Asian Journal of Thomas Merton, ed. Naomi Burton, Brother Patrick Hart, and James Laughlin, p. 308]

Dharma Talks