Own Your Words
Words Have Power
The words we use can be powerful, and they either give us power or take it away from us. The scary part is oftentimes if you’re not aware of the language you use, you won’t know which is which.
One of the quickest ways we lose and gain personal power is just through the misuse of one word in our everyday lives. See if you can find it in these sentences:
“You know, it’s like sometimes you don’t really know what’s going on, but you have to make a decision quick.”
“You feel really frustrated with yourself and the world, and you just want to scream and explode!”
“You can’t help it, I mean, when you hear something like that you just feel like you’re on top of the world!”
Any of these sentences sound familiar? They could be close to something you’d say yourself in any given day, right? Picked the word out yet?
The word is ‘you’.
Many times, we describe our own feelings and opinions using the word ‘you’ instead of ‘I’. It seems like a culturally accepted way of talking, but by doing so, we don’t take ownership of our own feelings and opinons and the price is we lose our personal power over them.
Read those sentences again, changing ‘you’ for ‘I’ and notice how differently they sound:
“You know, it’s like sometimes I don’t really know what’s going on, but I have to make a decision quick.”
“I feel really frustrated with myself and the world, and I just want to scream and explode!”
“I can’t help it, I mean, when I hear something like that I just feel like I’m on top of the world!”
Own Your Words
In coaching, one of the quickest ways I get people to develop personal power is just to notice whenever they’re talking about their own experiences, feelings and opinions when using the word ‘you’, and asking them to talk using the word ‘I’ instead, and notice how differently they feel.
All of the time, they say they feel more congruent, more confident, and more honest about themselves when they own their own words this way, and it’s oftentimes obvious in the way their expressions and body language change, almost instantly.
But don’t just take my word for it, test it out yourself. Say something about how you’re feeling, or your day today, or some opinion you have in which you’d usually use the word ‘you’ to describe the way you’re feeling to somebody you’re talking to.
Now change the word ‘you’ around to ‘I’ and notice how differently you feel, and even if it sounds a little uncomfortable at first, you’d notice how much more congruent and aligned you feel almost immediately. If you feel uncomfortable, relax, it just means you’re learning something new and stretching outside your comfort zone.
Using ‘I’ Power
I’d invite you to bring this sense of ownership and personal power more and more into your life. Whenever you say something in which you mean ‘I’ but you use the word ‘you’ to describe instead, like an opinion you have, or something you feel, change it around back to ‘I’.
For example:
‘You just know when you see it, that’s what you want,’ to
‘I just know when I see it, that’s what I want.’
At first you might have to spend more effort into becoming aware of what you say, but whenever you do catch yourself, change immediately, and it’ll become easier.
If you feel awkward changing, it’s only natural, but you can either stretch outside of your comfort zone and become a more confident and congruent human being who takes ownership of your own words, or just remain the way you’ve always been.
Some people are going to say, but there’s nothing wrong with using the word ‘you’ in conversations sometimes to describe things! Yes, there’s nothing wrong with that at all, I do it too, and sometimes I need to use it purposefuly as well.
But the question is; do you have choice between the two? Can you switch effectively between them and be the chooser of your words instead of having words choose themselves for your? I’d rather you opt for the former and more power than the latter.
I really enjoyed this post. It’s easy to forget how powerful our physical reactions are! I like your approach here. Especially reminding the reader that we are not always ready for change — though we think we are! I agree that the real failure is letting fear stop us. Thanks for posting this!
Hi Julie,
Thank you for your kind words. I am glad it was helpful! “Coping with Stress” is a part of a series of articles on Stress that I have written, hopefully Life Coaches Blog will be posting the rest. So keep in touch!
Kindest regards,
Karen
This is a great article. I especially like the list of symptoms… some of which a lot of people may not recognize as a sign of stress.
It’s also important to continue with your stress managment activities even when there are no signs or symptoms of stress. Doing this will help you become stressed less often and ward off stress before it even begins.
Hi Jill,
Absolutely, it should be a way of life! Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts.
Kindest regards,
Karen
Hi,
Great site!!!!! Good health is very important with the high cost of medical coverage. We need to have a healther lifestyle by taking care of our health eating and exercising. I am a cancer survivor and I know. Our health is our greatest asset. Keep up the Good Work!!!!!
The physical body does not differentiate between happy stress and overwhelm. Stress is stress. We need to develop coping mechanisms in our daily life to avoid the harmful, physiological effects of stress.