"Where Is Your Word When It Comes Time For You To Keep Your
Word?"
Coombsville Appellation,
Napa Valley,
California, USA
April 16, 2026
"Transformation shows up in my mouth."
...
"We all know that when we give our word, our word is so to speak in
our mouths (and if
we are awake,
then also
in our ears
in being aware that we have just given our word). When one is giving
one's word, one's word exists in one's mouth, but exists there only
for the duration one is speaking. The question is where does your word
go - where does your word exist - after you have closed your mouth?
More critically, the question is where is your word when it comes
time for you to keep your word?"
Werner
posed the question ("pro-posed the question" works
just as well) "Where is your word when it comes time for you to keep
your word?". And if you've never looked at it / never asked that
question before, maybe a good place to start is with another,
earlier question (if you will) which is this: "Where is
your word when you give your word?". So you've given your
word. Now it's time to keep your word. Where is your
word now? Where exactly?
One answer to the latter question is so blindingly obvious, so
god-damned
simple
that it could be missed entirely. When I give my word, my word
shows up
in my
language
ie in my speaking, and therefore (literally) in ... my ...
mouth.
Werner
recreates this often in what sounds like a very unusually-phrased
adage,
"Transformation shows up
in my mouth.". You could spend a lot time
debating that, before
discovering
that it's
perfectly,
elegantly,
brilliantlytrue.
I don't have the answer to
Werner's
question "Where is your word when it comes time for you to keep your
word?".
I may have an answer for it. Maybe I even have more than
one "an" answer for it. But I certainly don't have the
answer to it - as if my answer is not only the answer but
as if it's the right one (as if there even is
such a thing as the right answer). Anything I say here is my
inquiry into it, rather than my final conclusions drawn
from it.
"In my commitment" isn't a satisfactory answer to his question.
"Commitment" isn't the ballpark of the answer. While I'm
committed to keeping my word, "In my commitment" isn't a
satisfactory answer for me to the question "Where is your word when
it comes time for you to keep your word?". The perils of
"commitment" as an answer, are fraught with the same perils as my word
is. The question "Where is your commitment when it comes
time for you to fulfill on your commitment?" is really the same
question highlighting the same issues with my commitment, as
Werner's
original
question does with regard to my word. And by
the way,
you could also say "My word
shows up
in my mouth" just as you could also say "Commitment
shows up
in my mouth.".
Taking another cut at some possible answers to the question "Where
is your word when it comes time for you to keep your word?", one
place it's not is in the fact that I gave my word.
We all know (New Year's resolutions, anyone?) giving your word (with
all best intentions) that you'll do something ie that you said you'll
make something happen, won't ensure you'll keep your word. Giving my
word (as in "My word
shows up
in my mouth') is not where I'll find it when it comes time to keep my
word. The word that I gave when I said I would make something happen ie the
word that was "in my mouth" when I gave it, only exists for the
duration of my speaking it (that's
vintage Erhard).
It's "in my mouth" only for as long as I'm speaking it.
Then where will it be?
Most
people
have no
idea
what happens to their word when they close their mouth: it simply goes
out of existence. So again the question "Where is your word when it
comes time for you to keep your word?". When I gave my word, it was
in my mouth. As for where it is, now that I've closed my mouth
(
*** SPOILER ALERT! ***)
it has
disappeared.
If I'm going to keep my word, I need a way to
take action
on the word I gave, when the time comes for me to keep my word. And as
for where that word is now, my proposal for that is: it would be
written down somewhere, calendarized in my diary which would be either
online or on my desk. It's pure folly to rely on memory to remind me
about what I've promised, and "by when" I promised to deliver it. One
of many "an" answers for
Werner's
question "Where is your word when it comes time for you to keep your
word?" is "It's in my Letts of London diary.". Being
reminded (online by an alert or by referring to my diary
on my desk) about an upcoming due deliverable, then when I keep my word
and declare that I've done so, an answer to the question "Where is
your word when it comes time for you to keep your word?" is "It's
in my mouth - again.".
We could continue with this conversation by having it include
suggestions for and examples of which tools are the most effective for
keeping your word in existence, and how best to deploy them, so that
when it comes time for you to keep your word, rather than it having
gone out of existence since you gave it, you can deliver the results
you promised when you said you would. Indeed, that could be another
subject for another conversation on another occasion.
Postscript:
The presentation, delivery, and style of
"Where Is Your Word When It Comes Time For You To Keep Your
Word?"
are all my own work.
The ideas recreated in
"Where Is Your Word When It Comes Time For You To Keep Your Word?"
were first originated, distinguished, and articulated by
Werner Erhard.
