Vocabulary Exchange
A simple exercise, which you can do anywhere and anytime,
brings home many of the concepts of cognitive behavioral change. It is the
process of learning to exchange vocabulary. So any time you hear or think the
words on the left, consciously exchange them for the words on the right:
Instead of thinking:
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Try thinking:
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must
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prefer
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should
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it is desirable
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have to
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choose to
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need
|
want
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canÕt
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choose not to
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ought
|
had better
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never
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rarely
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nothing
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very few
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everything
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most
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all
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many
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always
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often
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cant stand
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donÕt like
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awful
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highly undesirable
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bad person
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bad behavior
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I am a failure
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I failed at
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Start listening to others, and youÕll realize how often we
use the absolute terms, and how limiting they can be.
You can see how simply exchanging our vocabulary reduces
black/white, all-or-nothing, good/evil thinking. YouÕll begin to cringe when
you hear people making what will now seem like extreme statements, as you
realize that it is rarely accurate to use an absolute term. Simply describing
our situation more accurately can be the first step in enacting change.
Ellis coined the term musterbation for what weÕre doing to ourselves when we go through
life using absolute words, filtering events and judging people through these
warped absolute prisms. When we view ourselves through those prisms, we
exacerbate guilt, we exaggerate situations, and we cut off the option of
change.
So we ÒrarelyÓ say never, and Ònot muchÓ is absolute.