How are you? How’s your day going so far?Careful how you answer.These typical questions get asked at least daily and we usually reply with a rote response: ‘fine’, ‘OK’, ‘terrible’, ‘you wouldn’t believe’, ‘don’t even ask’. Sometimes it’s just a noise that comes out. ‘Ugh’ says it all.We speak without giving a second thought to the words we use or their effect on ourselves or others.Our language, the words we choose and our common phrases, informs our subconscious (that faithful servant of ours) of what is expected of it. Remember that the subconscious, which controls much of our behaviour and function, doesn’t discriminate commands based on usefulness, nor does it have a sense of humour.Ben yells: “I’ve lost my keys. I don’t know where they are. I’ve looked everywhere. I need to go and I can’t find them!”Bob walks in. “They’re right here,” he says, picking up the keys from exactly where Ben had been looking.Ben had scoured the area but all the while chanting: ‘I’ve lost my keys’.This is the power of the subconscious doing what it is told. Ben literally couldn’t see the keys because he was telling his brain they were lost.It comes back to the same phrase I write almost weekly: we get what we focus on. And our language is a great director of focus.You will recall that the subconscious also cannot distinguish a negative … (the whole, ‘don’t think of a pink elephant’ example). Just imagine how unhelpful we are being when we issue commands, like ‘don’t drop that!’, ‘don’t move’, ‘don’t fall’!If the subconscious is taking everything we say literally, what else are we informing it to deliver? Self-deprecating jokes, reoccurring negative self-talk, repetitive teasing, comments or criticism … said enough, the subconscious will present the biased evidence to confirm them. ‘An old codger like me’, ‘I’m so fat I can never find a thing to wear’, ‘I’m such a klutz’, ‘I never get anything right’, ‘butterfingers’, ‘don’t be so stupid’, ‘the middle child is always a troublemaker’, ‘I’m a smoker’ ...What are you talking yourself into?What is your repeating negative talk? If you don’t know, ask your friends and family, they hear you everyday. Can you detect any limiting beliefs (see last week’s column) in what you repeatedly say? Are you focusing your subconscious (or someone else’s) on detrimental things?Habitual language patterns will reinforce habitual behaviour patterns. Break the habit, ie change the language and the perception and behaviour will follow. Instead ask: What empowering things can I tell myself on a daily basis that will be useful, support me in my goals and create a positive perception of myself and others?Not only do our thoughts and language create our perceptions and determine our actions, they also have a direct bearing on our physiology. Our bodies create chemical reactions to words and we physically connect to what we say. Have you noticed how we can get caught up in the ‘story’, and relive all the feelings attached to what is being said. We can even pre-live things too — invoke a negative mental state around things that haven’t even happened.Talk radio is a great way to observe this (noticeable as we are somewhat distanced from the speaker). Callers can get very worked up by what they are discussing, re-experiencing their emotions surrounding a subject. We can almost hear them getting red-faced, their blood pressure rising when they are caught up in an angry story/idea/projection. Or if the subject is a gloomy one their voices drop and we can easily imagine their shoulders slumping, heads hung low.Talking can take us right into the emotional state of what we are talking about. And we tend to talk about the same subjects again and again. Without realising it, our habitual conversations, stories and anecdotes can end up defining us through our mood, attitude and outlook.We also hear people reacting badly to things that haven’t happened yet: ‘it’s gonna be a tough week’, ‘Mondays suck’, ‘my mother-in-law is coming to visit, what a nightmare’. Just saying those words they are depressed or defeated before they even begin, limiting their chances of finding any joy in what is to come, having created such a negative association to it. A typical self-fulfilling prophecy.The first step to combating the emotional roller-coaster of our speech is awareness. Notice what you talk about on a regular basis. What are your repetitive stories? How do you feel when you are telling them? Are the emotions they conjure serving you or are they contributing to keeping you stuck in an unhelpful state or pattern.One choice here of course is that we can change our stories. By focusing on the positives — the things we have, have learned or are grateful for — we are bringing these things to the forefront of our subconscious and it follows that the evidence we will see will be of abundance.If, however, our old stories contain information that we need to retell, one way to limit the negative effects of our words is to reduce the intensity of our language — using less dramatic words so as not to elicit such a strong internal response. Compare now saying to yourself, ‘I am furious!’ to, ‘I was a little cheesed off’. Or ‘it was devastating’ as opposed to ‘I felt hurt’. Do you feel a difference in your emotional state between them?The same works in the positive. Compare, ‘it’s all right’ to ‘it’s fantastic!’ Which feels better?Control over our choice of words gives us better control of our emotions, and ultimately our overall well-being.Beyond sharing news and experience, many of us indulge in ‘disaster stories’ for various subconscious benefits: to get attention, to get sympathy, to feel significant, special, to entertain, to win approval or affection, even to relive the emotions because we’ve become attached to them. We may say we are expressing our anger/hurt/fear etc by rehashing unhappy stories but if we are choosing words that are subconsciously recreating that anger/hurt/fear etc, we are not venting it, instead we are fuelling it.Awareness of our motivation and the potential side effects of our language, gives us an opportunity to choose what we put out into the world and say what is best for us.Top tip — Sometimes we feel we just need a good rant or moan. Denying our feelings can often strengthen them, so get it out. Best to warn whomever you’re talking to that they are going to be your whining board, then let rip … BUT give yourself a time limit, literally set a timer. Five minutes maximum to exhaust your feelings. And when the buzzer goes, it’s done. Put a cap on it and leave it there, behind you. Immediately look for positives (what can I learn from this?) to replace those negatives with and that is what you take forward.Next week we’ll be looking at more ways to empower our communication and make our words work for us.But for now I’ll ask again: How are you?Or more to the point: How do you want to be?Julia Pitt is a trained success coach and certified NLP practitioner. For further information telephone 705-7488 or visit www.juliapittcoaching.com.