Change your words, change your life!

Words are powerful – and the mind is listening (Marisa Peer)

There is a saying in Spanish that goes: “las palabras se las lleva el viento” (words are carried away by the wind). But the truth is that the words we choose have an immense power over our mind, our body and our emotions. In this blog post I’ll explain how what we are saying and thinking to ourselves can have a hypnotic effect on our subconscious and shape our inner and outer perception.

But don’t be alarmed – with the 3 power tools I’m sharing below you’ll be able to get control over your thoughts and emotions and even change your (previously labled: hopeless) circumstances!

“Words are thoughts. Without them we can’t think” (Dangerous Minds movie)

Words are indeed thoughts, as in: words we say to ourselves quietly. If you’ve had any experience with meditation and mindfulness practices, you’ll know that our mind is constantly thinking (talking) about any- and everything. It’s like a record played nonstop and over and over again to which we listen, oftentimes without even noticing it… hey, does that remind you of anything? It does, doesn’t it, of nothing less but hypnosis! 

Hypnotherapist are known to give their patients tapes to listen to over and over again, with words that are supposed to infiltrate into their subconsciousness and help them overcome an addiction, achieve weight loss, free them of fears and phobias… you name it!

Words repeated to yourself often will indeed cling to your subconscious mind and continue to act below the surface. That’s why it’s incredibly important to analyze what stories we continuously feed ourselves and whether it’s doing us harm or empowering us!

Thoughts become things

So what kind of things you saying to yourself? 

Every word you choose has a meaning attached to it that may be rooted in cultural or societal beliefs, or in your own experiences and history. 

The meanings you attach to words lead to your EMOTIONS. We often think that we “can’t help the way we feel”, but in fact, emotions are always reactions (that occur within a millisecond) to something we say to ourselves, as neuro-scientific studies prove.

Furthermore, words can induce a biochemical reaction in our bodies. When you say things like “I’m so sad” or “This makes me feel depressed”, your shoulders are likely to slug, your breath becomes shallow, you might lose your appetite… Saying that you’re disappointed (and consequently feeling that way) might result in a pain in the stomach, a lump in your throat and so forth.

Whatever physical manifestations you experience, make no mistake, it was a word or story that set this reaction into motion!

Change your thoughts, change your life (Tony Robbins)

So if repeated words are the root cause of our emotions and can work like a hypnosis tape on our subconsciousness… we absolutely cannot afford to speak them carelessly! I encourage you to become aware of them and write down the most common thoughts and stories you tell yourself. Awareness is the first step to change and the more conscious your grow, the more carefully you will choose the words you speak.

With the help of the 3 Power Tools below, you will be able to make profound and lasting changes in your life:

POWER TOOL 1: Pimp your vocabulary!

It’s estimated that we use only a fraction of the vocabulary available to us in any language. Studies show that people tend to experience up to a dozen emotions on a regular basis. When contrasted with the broad array of emotions there are, you’ll come to find that what you’re feeling is most probably a simplification: let’s say for instance that you find yourself feeling “angry” on a regular basis. Is it possible that half of the time you’re feeling something else instead, for instance annoyed? Bewildered? Embarrassed? Misunderstood? Overloaded? Peeved? Uneasy? Vulnerable? 

To get your juices flowing I’d like to share a few links with you with extensive lists of emotions (in English, auf Deutsch y en español) for you to go through.

If you can become more assertive in your choice of words, you’ll find that you’ll be feeling different emotions and in different intensities; your body will modify its biochemical reactions accordingly, too.

POWER TOOL 2: Word-Upgrade Challenge

For one week, I’d like to encourage you to purposely exchange some of the negative words (and emotions) you’re saying (feeling) to less intensive ones. At the same time, upgrade your positive words and emotions! 

Instead of saying things like “this is a catastrophe” or “this sucks” you might say “This is quite a challenge” or “this is annoying”. Or instead of saying “I’m fine” or “the movie was good”, why not dare to say “I’m feeling fantastic” or “the movie was breathtaking!”

Note how, thanks to this little vocabulary hack, your emotions and physical reactions that follow are completely different in the before and after?

As always, my advice is to: 

1. start this challenge with minor things like in the examples above (you’re not gonna be laid off your work and tell yourself how it’s “a little annoying”! This exercise is not meant to make you stupid, but to make you more assertive and resourceful by correcting the simplifications and ambiguity we all experience when expressing ourselves).
   
2. You don’t have to force yourself to believe it just yet. No need to start arguing with yourself (à la: “This is a bit of a challenge… No, this is a freaking mess!!! … I mean, it’s an annoying situation…. Although it really, truly sucks!!” ) Just keep an open mind and substitute new (better) thoughts for the old ones, without questioning it. After some time you will start doing this automatically and grow incredibly more resourceful, resilient and in control of yourself. If you want to better understand why this works and how, check out my blog post about Neuroplasticity.

POWER TOOL 3: Change your negative commands to positive ones

Have you ever noticed how our brain cannot process negative commands? For instance, if you tell yourself “Don’t look, don’t look, don’t look”….. what will you most probably do? Look! Whenever we make a negative command to ourselves, we are actually intensifying and attracting that very thing we do NOT want. I’m sure you’ve experienced such monologues many times before: “I can’t eat another piece of cake, I cannot! It’s just so delicious, maybe if I have a teeny tiny one…” or “Don’t cry now… don’t cry… don’t you (sob, sob, sob…)”

By making positive statements, you’ll be able to take control over your mind. Instead of “Don’t look” you might say, “I want to see something pleasant” (and your brain will go look for more pleasant things to see). Instead of saying “I can’t have that cake” say “I really want to feel healthy and good in my body.” And your brain’s solution might be to have a large glass of water and if you’re still hungry, to eat an apple. 

Your outer world is a reflection of your inner world (T. Harv Eker)

By applying these three power tools to your life, you will notice how through changing your personal narrative and thus provoking different emotions, your perception and therefore your circumstances will change.

You’ll strongly benefit from increased assertiveness in your choice of words: a catastrophe really isn’t the same as a challenge, an obstacle or an unpleasant incident! And there is no need to put your mind and body, which are connected, through the incredible stress of “facing a catastrophe” – which our brain equals to an attack of a sabre-toothed tiger (as in, the kinda “catastrophes” our ancestors faced…)

The new year is a great time to implement positive changes into your life, and if you give these hacks an honest shot you will reap the rewards!

As always, drop me a comment to let me know how this is working out for you!