Adage 12 of Master Sheng Yen's 108 Adages of Wisdom notes " Before you open your mouth to speak, think twice and chew your words carefully. The point is not to hold your peace, but to speak with discretion and prudence."
In this day and age, I begin to wonder, does Master Sheng Yen's words make sense? The idea is that prudence and discretion encourage a sense of restraint and wisdom. This isn't t say that one should be diplomatic all the time in order to "hold the peace" but it might mean something like being able to choose words in a way that promotes good heartedness. For example, rather than hinting that someone else is not behaving their best (or according to my own judgments and beliefs), perhaps I would do better to try to use words that promote harmony and build understanding between people. If my intention is only to create divisiveness, this will only cause suffering to all the parties in the long run. But if I am sincerely invested in helping all the parties sort out differences and truly understand one another, then I am promoting wisdom between people.
Actually, our culture values so-called "authenticity", which often translates to, "The first thing you say is often the most true thing to say." Is that correct, though? More often than not, one's first impression, thought or emotion is just that--an impression--and it can often reflect a prejudice of sorts rather than an authentic way of seeing things. Discretion is needed to sort the valuable from the dross, and simply saying what's on the top of one's head is no guarantee that it's either "true" or beneficial to others. To a certain extent, I reject this idea that somehow my first impressions are the "truest"form of myself.
http://www.dharmadrum.org/content/about/about2.aspx?sn=46
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