Taming the Dragon: The Power of Our Words

Today, I sat with my middle child as he worked on his school assignments. One of his classes is social-emotional learning, and as I listened in, his teacher introduced a powerful analogy. She compared our words to dragons—fierce and full of fire. She explained that just like dragon trainers, we must learn to control our tongues, ensuring that our words build others up instead of tearing them down.

Both of my boys sat next to each other, listening intently. We exchanged glances—silent recognition of the struggles they’ve had lately in speaking kindly to one another. But as I absorbed the lesson, I realized this wasn’t just something they needed to hear. It was something I needed to reflect on as well.

The more I think about this analogy, the more I love it. Our words are powerful, untamed creatures. When left unchecked, they can scorch those around us, leaving behind wounds that may never fully heal. But when we learn to control them, to wield their strength with wisdom and intention, they become something entirely different. They can be protectors, messengers of truth, and carriers of warmth.

Much like a dragon rider must understand and respect the power of their beast, we must recognize the weight of our words. A dragon’s fire can destroy, but it can also provide light and warmth. In the same way, our words have the ability to wound or to uplift, to discourage or to empower. Mastery takes discipline, and the first step is awareness—awareness of how we speak to others and, just as importantly, how we speak to ourselves.

I know this struggle intimately. My inner critic is relentless, breathing fire that often threatens to consume me. She tells me I’m not enough, that I’m failing, that my efforts will never measure up. But I’ve been learning—slowly, painfully—to tame her. To take the fire meant for destruction and reshape it into something that fuels growth instead. I’m learning to replace words of doubt with words of truth. To rewrite the narrative. Because if I don’t, that fire doesn’t just stay inside me—it spreads.

I have felt the burn of untamed words from others, and I have, in moments of anger or exhaustion, let my own dragon run wild, hurting the very people I love most. And that realization stings. My words shape my children’s inner voices, just as the words spoken to me shaped mine. I want them to carry voices of encouragement, not echoes of self-doubt. I want my words to reflect love, wisdom, and truth—not frustration or impatience.

But I fail. Often. I stumble in the practice of taming my dragon, just as my boys stumble in taming theirs. Still, we keep trying. We keep learning. Because this work—this effort to be mindful of the fire we unleash—is worth it.

So here’s to the lifelong task of taming our dragons. To speaking words that heal rather than wound. To using our fire wisely, with intention, with love. May we learn to master the power of our words, so they leave behind not destruction, but light.