The seven most destructive words that can come out of your mouth

The English language has about a million words in it—here's one combination to avoid if you want self worth and to achieve your potential to live a great life.

In the English language, there are around a million total words. About 170,000 are in use at the moment and up to 30,000 words are used by each person. That's a lot of combinations and sentences.

But one, with just seven words in it, could be the most destructive to come out of your mouth.

I am not that type of person

These seven words shape your reality by limiting the life you can have based on preconceptions and on factors you had little control of growing up.

Your parents, mentors, friends, teachers, experiences you overcome, all go into a melting pot that shapes who we are.

We subconsciously pick up on our parents' behaviours in our formative years.

Our teachers can either lift us or tear us down with the words they say to us. How many successful people were told they would never amount to anything by their teacher?

Something terrible will happen in our lives, and we can make it mean anything. Sometimes we can make it mean we are a failure, or terrible at something, or we are a terrible person.

Language has a more powerful effect on us than we even realise. The negative words we say out loud to ourselves about ourselves have an insanely negative affect on our lives.

95 per cent of what we do daily is subconscious, according to development biologist Dr Bruce Lipton. So the old story we tell ourselves has a significant influence on our lives.

If we think we are a specific type of person, we will limit ourselves based on that old story we told ourselves.

The biggest mistake I made, and I see other people make is they believe their personality or their thinking is fixed.

It is simply not true.

As US positive thinking author Dr Norman Vincent Peale put it, "If you want things to be different, perhaps the answers is to become different yourself".

Years ago I imagined myself to have money, be fit healthy, have the body I wanted, be happy and get paid for doing what I love. But it was all intellectual—I wasn't that person.

I had the character, the skillset, the routines, the standards of someone else. My thinking, my rules and habits were all of the person I was, not the person I wanted to become. The story I was telling myself was not aligned with the future I desired.

So that realisation that for me to achieve my dreams and create the life I want, I had to change, the ultimate responsibility.

I had entrepreneur and motivational speaker Jim Rohn's quote burning in my brain. "For things to change, you have to change, for things to get better you have to get better, for things to improve you have to improve, and when you grow everything in your life grows with you." 

I tried to reason with it, fight with it, find another way but it wasn't happening for me. No matter how hard I pushed, things didn't change.

I even tried justifying my situation with my story. I said I would have a certain amount of success. Just not as much as the top entrepreneurs or speakers because I am not the type of person that gets up at 5 am and trains, meditates and has a powerful morning routine. All because I told myself I wasn't a morning person.

This story and many other stories I took as reality because I told them to myself over and over.

As much as I didn't want to believe it was me that needed to change, I had to make a decision. Get after the life I want or stay stuck with my story and live with regret in the future.

People will defend the type of person they are, and all the things they cannot do based on past programming. They know clearly who they are not and what kind of things they cannot do.

I want us all to fight and defend all the fantastic things we can do and become. Chasing dreams is to be celebrated. Changing who we should be encouraged.

Ask the questions, 'Is the person I am now in line with what I want to achieve? Do I have the mindset, the character, the thinking, the habits, the routines, the standards and the values of the person that gets to have the life I want?

If the answer is no, you can change it.

It takes work.

It is not easy.

People will question and doubt you.

It is possible.

Start by removing one word.

I am the type of person.

I am the type who will [insert every epic thing you want to be and achieve.]

Daniel Burgess is a Pro Coach mentor at The Coaching Institute, and a speaker and coach. Working one-on-one, he has helped hundreds of people develop self-belief and overcome their biggest challenges. He has coached thousands of people to rewrite their stories and chase their dreams.

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Dan BurgessThe Coaching Institute
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