“Everyone else in this house is okay with it. Do you always have to be difficult?”

“I’ve been on my feet for the past eight hours. Would it kill you to take the baby for a minute?”

“Stop that! And that! And that! And that! And that!”

“Do I look like I want to play Stratego with you right now?”

“Yes, I’m baking a cake for your brother. If you’d do half the amount that he does around here, you would understand why I’m doing this.”

“Maybe if you’d look before you started running….”

“Get back into bed this second, before I….”

All these comments were warranted, trust me. And they went unsaid.

When I was younger, someone told me that children model the language they hear at home. So I tried. I spoke, I taught, I verbally pointed out every missed opportunity and potential mitzvah, especially those that involved listening to their mother.

But when they started arguing over who got the bottle of soda first at the Shabbos seudah, I challenged the “words are builders” notion. I can assure you my husband and I have never, ever fought over a bottle of soda. And although we may have disagreed, in civil tones, about what temperature was appropriate for the AC setting at night, our worst fight never used any words remotely close to what my children use on each other.

So yes, maybe children repeat what they hear at home. But they also use language they’ve picked up at school. And at the neighbors’ houses. And in the books they read.

The powerful words of inspiration and mussar my children hear in school and yeshivah? They struggle to repeat much of it at home, so it’s hard for me to believe that it’s as impactful as the teachers believe them to be. I hope the kind words they hear go deep into their souls. (The criticism? That, my children remember forever. Cue the overwhelmed teacher who told a class of third-grade students that they’d lost their Olam Haba. My little one was depressed about that for a while.) I’ve learned not to worry that my children will grow up savages because I didn’t tell them not to fight with each other. They’ll learn to hold their babies when they cry, even if I don’t tell them to hold mine. They’ll probably learn to clean up after themselves even if I don’t tell them to, and if they don’t, well, my words won’t make a dent in any case.

My actions might. If I model and model, show them with a smile, they might emulate me one day in the far future.

Today, I no longer venerate the power of a word. I can’t imagine that a well-deserved sarcastic comeback will get my teenagers to change their phone habits. Not even a good joke. I’ve tried those, too. They will say goodnight to their friends when their common sense kicks in, not when my words (and hand motions) get desperate.

It’s time for me to cut back on the spoken word and tune in to the unspoken ones.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 909)