Part 1
me
“Who caught you?”
“What would you like to take out?”
“I feel lonely because I can’t be alone.”
“Am I a parasite?”
“They say that even spring flowers have a certain order in which they bloom.”
“Someone worse than you will leave.”
“I came because I was lonely.”
"why?"
“I can’t even study”
“Or straight or comfortable”
“Are you going to lie again?”
“Isn’t it hard for anyone?”
“I am 100% right.”
“I’m behind you.”
"That's you"
“The results are not mine.”
“They are Iranian twins.”
“What is this mind that arises?”
“I don’t know you when things are going well.”

Part 2
Born
“There was soju.”
“What’s truly scary isn’t the water.”
“It’s good, but why am I nervous?”
“Raise the blue flag, raise the white flag”
“If you wake me up one more time, I’ll kill you.”
“Even after trying 108 methods, it still didn’t work.”
“Don’t starve”
“What are you going to do?”
“Is this real?”
“Binding someone together doesn’t make them a couple.”
“Do you think you’re the only one having a hard time?”
“Oh, good.”
“It’s a tree that needs to be watered with a bucket of water.”
“How can it be this unfair?”
“Where is the person who is good from the beginning?”
“Is this a trip?”
“Yeah, I’m worried.”
“There are four types of people.”
“So that no one is wronged”

Part 3
言
“Still go”
“Don’t do it for me.”
“Are you done?”
“If a nuclear bomb explodes, will you live or die?”
“Am I wrong?”
“That’s what they teach you at home.”
“What difference does it make if I talk?”
“What are you talking about now!”
“So what’s the conclusion?”
“I take responsibility.”
“Why didn’t you catch it when I took the picture?”
“Was it so hard to ask why?”
“Water tastes the best.”
“Please give me a male to adopt.”
“Why did you decide that?”
“You are more important”
“Why don’t you learn to speak with your hands?”
“I don’t watch anything longer than 3 minutes.”
“Do you know what I mean?”
“I like it because you like it.”
“I don’t even know the line”

Collected by counseling experts
A word that saves you and me from our hardships
It's a tough world.
I try my best to pull myself together, but one adversity after another follows another.
For family, for dreams, for the future, we muster new strength and overcome another day, but it is even harder when the hope of better days comes and whips us along.

When you get caught up in your role, you often fail to take care of yourself.
I try to find and read books about taking care of my self-esteem and self-worth to feel better, but it's difficult to take care of myself in theory.

So, more than anything, a word of delicate comfort is needed.
But it's not easy to hear such words even from people close to you.
Haste words can actually cause harm.
The most necessary, yet in fact the most difficult words, are words of comfort.

Seo-won Lee, author of “Words that Save Me,” has been working as a counselor for a long time.
I have collected 'words that save me' from my experiences and cases of counseling people who are hurt and those who hurt others, and have included them in this book along with vivid stories.

'Words that save me' are the advice and comfort I can give to myself.
These are words that resonate differently depending on the situation, the mind, and the buried worries.
Stories that provide a clue to solving the unresolved pain in my heart also become the topic of today that saves me.


A word that gives me the strength to live as myself
The book is divided into three parts.
Each section is themed around a character from the Chinese character title of the book, 'Words that Save Me', '我生言(Ah-saeng-eon).

Part 1 deals with me.
It contains words and stories that comfort and help me take care of myself when I am having a hard time.
The author introduces anecdotes related to stories he experienced and heard in counseling settings and unforgettable words from his life.
In particular, anecdotes from the hermitage where he stayed when he began his studies as a counselor are interspersed here and there.
The first story in the book is also a story from that time.
One day, the monk suggested that we go out together, and we drove together for three days without any destination or plan.
I went wherever I wanted to go, ate wherever I was hungry, and slept somewhere suitable when night came.
When the author told the monk that he was jealous, the monk looked at him blankly and asked,
“Who caught you?”
With those words, the life of a hermit who was supposed to write a doctoral dissertation in two or three months turned into five years.
It was because of the realization that everything I had to do was actually decided by me, and that it was I who had caught me.
As a social welfare doctor, professor, and counselor, those words have long been a topic of conversation in my life, and they have become a key to understanding the suffering of those who are immersed in their roles.

The author has been counseling perpetrators at a domestic violence counseling center for over 20 years.
In the process, I was able to encounter scenes of extreme suffering.
Violence and anger often began with a single word between loved ones or family members.
The author says that when you lose something precious, you feel sad, and when it is taken away, you feel angry.
We hurt each other because of the pain of not being able to live fully as ourselves.
The more I think about it, the more I need a single word that gives me the strength to live as myself, and I put those words into a book.


A word for those struggling through life, even if it's awkward.
Part 2 deals with life.
In the process of living a difficult life, we sometimes make mistakes and live with unresolved conflicts.
There are many ways to resolve this, but more than anything, we desperately need a single word that will give us the strength to correct ourselves and live again.
The author tells the story of a man in his 60s who participated in group counseling for domestic violence victims.
As an orphan, he never went a day without drinking soju.
I always had problems because of alcohol.
Everyone told him to quit drinking and criticized him for not being able to do so.
He came to the counseling room drunk and ended up causing an accident, and the author confronted him.
I asked the orphan if there was anyone who had listened to him when he was going through hard times in his life.
He said there wasn't one, but the author, who is a counselor, said there was one.

“There was soju! Even if all the black-haired beasts turned their backs on me and betrayed me, there was soju.
“Cry with me and understand my feelings.”
He said that for the first time in his life, he did not drink alcohol and did not touch it for at least six weeks until the counseling was over.
The door that had been tightly closed was opened to someone who understood alcohol and understood me.
When you acknowledge the target rather than criticize them, you gain the strength to face them.
The author says that since then he has seen 'Soju' in everyone.
I was able to have a deeper consultation after realizing that I had to be positive about soju in order to stop drinking it.

The author always says in the book that saving lives comes first.
In a life where we struggle even if we are clumsy, recognition is more important than encouragement.
The attitude and words that acknowledge each other and accept each other's situation are the words that save us.
I am introducing such cases and some words that come to mind.


A slightly better word we can say to each other
Part 3 deals with speech.
The closer we are to each other, the easier it is to talk.
So, there are many times when I say what I want to say rather than what the other person wants to hear.
It hurts and the relationship starts to go wrong.

They say they're all saying it for your benefit, but they say good things in a hurtful way.
Because the speaker's mind is relieved.
Also, because I believe that speaking painfully will make the other person change.
Square words with sharp angles do not enter round ears.
If you wish for that, it is just a 'square dream' like the song title.

Even if the content is the same, there are 'slightly better things' we can say to each other.
An angry person's words can be calmed down simply by asking back, appropriate words are more effective than correct words, depth is more important than explanation, and when praising, the purpose must be clear to avoid misunderstandings.

For speech to become a conversation, it must first belong to the listener.
A little better word for each other saves us and saves me.
The author wanted to include practical advice in this book that would help you build better relationships.