Our thoughts affect our emotions and our physiology. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy emphasizes that an event happens, we have a belief about that event, and based upon that belief or thought we experience a certain emotion. If we explore deeper into this and we hook a person up to a biofeedback device that measures various measures such as heart rate, respiration, brainwaves, muscle tension, or amount of perspiration, we find our thoughts have an influence on all of these. Our thoughts, which are then put into words and spoken to another, depending upon the words used and how the words are communicated to the other person will also have a measurable physiological effect upon another person’s physiology. So, it turns out that the adage “sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me” is not correct. Our words do influence another person(s). Our words can either be healing or damaging to another person. This has so many implications to ponder upon. We can either strengthen or weaken another person by our words in our relationship as a couple or a family. We need to understand as couples and families how we can either build a positive interaction or allow our communication to create a toxic environment. http://emapdrschulz.com