Have you experienced 'horrible' customer service, a 'rude' motorist, or 'terrible' traffic?
Have you had a 'bad' hair day, a 'shocking' headache or had to go out in 'miserable' weather?
Did you pick up what is consistent with each of these events?
It's the negative language!
How you describe something is exactly how you experience it.
When you describe an event/situation in negative terms, like
'miserable' weather or 'terrible' traffic - then your body feels
stressed and becomes tense and uptight.
Weather is never 'miserable' - it may be wet, stormy, strong, destructive, or really hot...but not miserable.
Being 'miserable' is a human emotion - weather doesn't feel emotion.
...it is your thinking that makes it a miserable experience.
Dr Rich Allen (Ph.D. in educational psychology) has studied how the brain receives, processes, stores and
recalls information. In a leadership program of 80 participants, a 60-second movie clip was shown of a car
travelling down a dirt road and then colliding with a barn.
Immediately after the clip the group was given a list of questions about what they had just seen. Two different questionnaires were then distributed. Half the participants were asked 'How fast was the car moving when the car bumped into the barn?' The other half were asked 'How fast was the car moving when the car smashed into the barn?'
The group that was asked to describe the collision as 'bumped' reported an average speed of 42km/hr. The group that was asked to describe the collision as 'smashed' reported an average speed of 67km/hr.
The alteration of a single word produced a significant change in the participants' perception of the film clip.
Think about your recent 'stresses'...
Are you making them more stressful because of the choice of words you are using to describe the 'terrible' day, 'idiot' client, 'stressful' job, or 'annoying' colleague? Imagine if you changed the word 'problem' to 'inconvenience' or the word 'frustrates' to 'bothers' - how much stress could you cut out of your work and life?
According to
Shunyam Nirav, author of
'Switchwords', (
www.switchwords.com/bbf ) your "intentional creative thoughts bring about intentional desired results".
Shunyam's research has found that your choice of words not only influences your stress levels, but also can determine what you achieve in life. He explains...
"...a researcher and genius named James T. Mangan (1896-1970) discovered in the past century that using only a single word to create with, instead of a long sentence, is much easier and more effective, and gives your creative energy a powerful laser-like focus in this single moment of now.
James Mangan identified about 100 certain single words that are extraordinarily effective when used as an intentional creative thought, to bring about a specific desired result. He called these special words "switchwords."
A "switchword" is the essence of an experience, condition, or desired result, expressed as a single word. Declare, affirm, chant, sing, or even just mentally "intend" the switchword, and like turning on an electric lamp with a switch, the desired result reliably appears.
For example, whenever you are searching for something you've misplaced, like a key, a tool, or an important paper, just start chanting REACH silently or aloud, and let yourself move wherever you feel to go. You'll soon find yourself going to exactly where the object is and retrieving it (or if it is actually gone, you'll quickly
reach a solution to the problem). Or, if you've forgotten someone's name or a number, just say REACH to retrieve it from your memory. (To memorize something you want to remember, say CARE.)
Likewise, to get a ride, say ON; to make money, COUNT; to experience love, LOVE; to create beauty, CURVE; to be wise, SLOW; for peace and good health, BE; for protection, GUARD; and about 100 more for other specific situations! The greatest treasure, though, is the master switchword for a life of heaven on Earth and mastery of any task at hand: TOGETHER."
James T. Mangan's source book The Secret of Perfect Living (Prentice-Hall, 1963-1975) has been for many years out of print and rare.
Shunyam Nirav recently created a new book about switchwords, called
SWITCHWORDS at
www.switchwords.com/bbf (you can download the first sample 43 pages).
