I often text, “I hope you’re doing great.” But, I’ve recently changed it to “I hope you’re feeling great.” I don’t know who started “I hope you’re doing great,” but when you think about it, “doing” exactly what great? Doing the laundry? Doing dinner? Doing life great?
When I was first dating my husband twenty something years ago before texting took over,
he always called me up and asked me, “Whatcha doing?” and I aways had a difficult time with that because it was so linear and after I would tell him I’m eating or sitting and so on, I would ask him what he was doing and he would tell me and then silence and awkwardness, or maybe if we got lucky, movement into a subject that would keep the conversation and relationship moving.
One day I asked him if he could start asking me, “How are you feeling?” and he found that strange at first, but after he tried it a few times we were able to have some more meaningful conversations early on which helped us to get to “know each other” because our hearts were included as well as our minds.
I hope you’re feeling well, great or good is a wonderful way to express a kindness that even if written or said in a polite, superficial way can have more of a positive impact than “I hope you’re doing great.”
I love words and am always striving to upgrade my communication with them, writing and especially speaking are the only ways to Give Great Voice — because it starts with the thought, which then becomes our words, which then becomes either a positive motivating force or a neutral/negative one, or a critical one. By becoming more aware of how we can use our words to make those we communicate with “feel good” the more they respond in kind and that impacts our relationship, which becomes our success in working relationships, our personal relationship and so on.
So try it sometime!
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