A NEUROSCIENTIST EXPLAINS WHY THESE 5 PHRASES ARE HOLDING YOU BACK AND WHAT TO SAY INSTEAD

Thank you to Inc. and author Minda Zetlin, author of 'Career Self-Care: Find Your Happiness, Success, and Fulfillment at Work' Read more here. 

‘Notice the way you’re talking to yourself,’ says brain expert Josh Davis.

The words we choose have a surprisingly powerful effect on our thoughts and emotions–and even our brain function. We can use that power to drive our success, push past doubts, and let go of past regrets. That insight comes from neuroscientist and author Josh Davis, who’s been studying the brain and how to make the best use of it for many years. He’s the author of the bestseller Two Awesome Hours: Science-Based Strategies to Harness Your Best Time and Get Your Most Important Work Done.

“There’s an art to learning to notice the way you’re talking to yourself or the way that someone else is talking,” Davis says. And, he adds, changing the words that you use–especially when talking to yourself–can alter both your emotional state and your understanding of the situations and challenges you encounter.

It’s a broad field, but here are a few examples of how changing a simple phrase can make a difference to your mental state. 

1. Change “I have to” to “I get to”

Davis illustrates this example by trying it out on me. “Do you have anything on your mind that makes you think, ‘I have to do this,’ or ‘I have to get this done?'” he asks.

I’ve just returned from giving a successful keynote. I made a few contacts, and I know I have to follow up with them about the possibility of future work. This task of following up on leads is something every entrepreneur has to do at least sometimes, and it’s something I’ve never enjoyed. 

“How does it feel if, just for a moment, you let yourself genuinely say, ‘I get to follow up with these people’?” Davis asks.

I realize that his reformulation makes a lot of sense. The whole reason I have potential customers to follow up with is that people loved the keynote–enough that several people who’d known nothing about me that morning were now open to working with me. One exec even approached me to ask about it. If I think of the act of following up on those successful connections as a pleasure and a celebration, rather than as a chore and an opportunity for being rejected–well that might change my whole outlook. It’s a perfect example of how altering a single word can make an enormous difference.

2. Change “we need a decision” to “we need to decide”

Watch out for nouns that are created from verbs, Davis says. When people use verbs that have been turned into nouns, “without realizing it, they tend to take something in their mind that’s a process and turn it into a fixed thing.”

“We need a decision” is just one example, he explains. “A decision is not really a thing. Deciding is an action with lots of steps.” Look at it that way, and you start planning how you’re going to decide. “It takes your mind to a different place than ‘We need a decision,'” he says. In the same way, changing “we need improvement” to “we need to improve” forces you to consider some important questions, such as what, specifically, needs to improve, and how you’re going to improve it.

Using verbs instead of nouns can be very powerful. Words like “decision” and “improvement” tend to be used as objects in sentences. (In “we need to make a decision,” for example, “we” is the subject and “decision” is the object.) Research shows that objects activate a different part of your brain from action words, which are usually verbs. Taking a verb that’s been turned into a noun and changing it back to a verb literally means you’re changing how your brain reacts to that sentence. The same goes for anyone else who hears it.

3. Change “I can’t” to “I might”

Some of the things we say, both to other people and to ourselves, reflect our mode of operating, Davis says. We should notice these phrases, he advises, and play with changing them. For example: “I just can’t do this.” We’ve all said that or something like it, many times. If you think about it, you’re also telling yourself that you can’t do it. 

Instead, try saying, “I might do this,” Davis says. That alone could put you in a whole different frame of mind. You could also try “It will be hard to do this”–it may be difficult but that won’t prevent you. Or you could ask yourself, “What’s stopping me from doing this?”

4. Change “I shouldn’t” to “What would happen if I did?”

“When you hear that language, ‘should’ or ‘shouldn’t,’ sometimes there’s a kind of burden or shame associated with it,” Davis says. “It’s worth pausing and saying, ‘Wait a sec. Do I really deserve to be operating with this burden or shame?'”

Instead, he suggests asking, “What would happen if I really did this?” Follow that mental process to see where it leads. Then you can decide whether this is something you won’t do (or will do) because of the possible consequences, or whether you’re letting unnecessary concern stop you from doing something you really want to do.

It’s not that you should or shouldn’t do whatever it is, Davis says. It’s that changing your statement this way will “help restart the thinking process.”

5. Change “I shouldn’t have” to “I’m sad that”

Of course, sometimes shoulds and shouldn’ts are in the past. “I shouldn’t have done this,” or “if only I’d done that.” Sentences like these can keep you wrapped up in shame or regret, Davis says.

You can’t change the past, so what can you do about those regrets? To answer that question, Davis invokes legendary psychologist Albert Ellis, one of the founders of cognitive therapy, who famously disliked the word “should.”

When it comes to regret, Davis says, “Albert Ellis would advise you to stop saying ‘I shouldn’t have’ and just say, ‘I’m sad that I did.’ Try to move away from regret or shame and on to just sadness, which involves acceptance.”

The big idea

There’s a core principle at the center of all this, Davis says. The big idea behind cognitive therapy is that the situation you’re in doesn’t cause your emotion. “We tend to think that it does,” he says. For example, you lose a major customer. You feel worried about it, and you believe that losing the customer is what made you feel that way.

“Cognitive psychology points out that, actually, that’s not correct,” Davis says. “The way it works is there’s something you have to do in between the situation and the emotion. You have to make meaning out of it.” In this case, the meaning you make from the loss of the customer might be that your business could fail, that your product is no good, that you never should have started the business, and on and on.

But of course, there could be a whole different meaning. You might have lost the customer not because they don’t value your product, but because they are struggling financially and are in danger of going under. And their departure might free you to find other customers who will be better in the long run.

This is why changing a few words can be such a powerful thing to do. “If you try new words, sometimes that can very quickly make the difference in helping somebody make new meaning,” Davis says.

There’s a growing audience of Inc.com readers who receive a daily text from me with a self-care or motivational micro-challenge or tip. Often, they text me back and we wind up in a conversation. (Want to learn more? Here’s some information about the texts and a special invitation to an extended free trial.) Many are entrepreneurs or business leaders and they know how important it is for their businesses and themselves to have a mindset that’s set for success. Choosing the right words can help all of us develop that mindset.