Change way of thinking word

What’s one way to change your way of thinking in this crazy parenting life?

Even before your eyes open, your mind is on “step on it” mode. Pack lunch: ham sandwiches, baby carrots, and raisins, times two. Drop kids off at school. Next stop: diapers from Target (don’t forget the gift for the baby shower). Get the minivan serviced. Make an appointment for the two-year-old’s well-child checkup (before she turns three). School pick-up, Taekwondo classes in the afternoon, followed by a quick stop at Walgreens. Thank God for the drive-through at the neighborhood Walgreens. Speaking of drive-throughs, that’s probably what’s for dinner tonight.

You’re tired before you even get out of bed. There’s a bajillion things you absolutely have to do today. You suppress a groan as you groggily turn off the alarm and steel yourself for the day ahead.

But here’s a thought: what if you and I replaced the “have to” with the words “get to?” Those two simple words – “get to” – have the power to transform our perspective on parenting.

You get to pack lunch for the kids.

You get to take them to school.

You get to take them to the doctor and to their after-school lessons.

You get to be their chef, their chauffeur, and their event planner.

Two years ago, my family and I moved from the U.S. to India where my husband and I were born and raised. For 12 years before that we lived in a suburb of Portland, Oregon. We had both completed graduate school in the U.S. Then came love, marriage, and two babies (born 17 months apart) in a baby carriage (more like a McLaren LX stroller). We loved our white-picket-fence life in suburbia. We were living the American Dream. Then, for a bunch of various non-dramatic reasons, we moved to India.

We lived a blessed life in America. We continue to live a life of more-than-enough in India. This wasn’t one of those Mother Theresa, let’s-make-this-world-a-better-place moves. We moved with a job that would provide enough for our daily needs and then some.

But every single day, as a person of privilege in India, I come face-to-face with the fact that I “get to” rather than I “have to.”

As I take my kids to school in an air-conditioned car, we pass by children sitting on mounds of sand outside construction sites where their parents work. Their naturally black hair is now bleached blond by the sun. Their moms carry piles of bricks and bags of cement through unfinished buildings. They don’t have the option of taking their kids to school. My “have to wake up when my iPhone alarm rings at 6:30 a.m.” complaints seem horrendously petty.

Moments like these are laced through my day.

• As I enjoy the rain from my penthouse apartment with its round-the-clock security guards and swimming pool, I look out the window to the street below me to see a family huddled under a blue tarp they call home. They don’t have to make the beds. They sleep on blankets on the hard ground.
• As I leave the grocery store with stuff that I don’t actually need, I am joined on the sidewalk by a child trying to sell me a coloring book or a bunch of pens. Her mom doesn’t have to do homework with her. In all likelihood, neither of them knows how to read.

I could go on and on. But you don’t have to move halfway across the world to see that your life, like mine, is filled with “get to” moments. The very fact that we have beds to make, laundry to tackle, lunches to pack, and dinners to serve is a privilege that millions don’t have. Our normal is someone else’s dream. The fact that we are doing most of this for people we love is the biggest “get to” of all.

Instead of looking at our lists as chores, we need to see them as opportunities. So I teach my kids that we are blessed by trying to provide small blessings to others. It may mean carrying bags of packaged cookies in the car to share with the kids who knock at our car window. It may mean tutoring an underprivileged child. It may mean keeping our used toys in the trunk to give to the next child sitting on a pile of sand. It’s a drop in the bucket.

But, slowly, all the drops add up, and while the bucket fills, my perspective changes from being a parent obsessed with just how crazy-hard my life is to one who acknowledges my abundance.

We need to change the game by changing our vocabulary. Let’s start every day realizing that our “have to’s” are really “get to’s.”

Language lets us communicate with each other and share our ideas. Some linguists even suggest that language shapes our knowledge and thought. So, expanding our vocabulary by learning new, interesting words can help us communicate better and have more ideas.

The average English speaking knows around 12,000 -25,000 words, yet the Oxford English Dictionary contains full entries for 171,476 words in current use. So, most of us are missing out on knowing, using, and enjoying thousands of interesting words.

Some linguists suggest that if we don’t have a word for a certain, it is almost impossible to understand that concept. Linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf was an early proponent of this idea, suggesting different linguistic systems affected the thoughts and behaviour of language users.

He studied the language of the Brazilian Piraha people and found that they have no word for quantity. In their language, there is just a word for one, and a word for more than one. This meant that they did not understand the concept of quantity in the same way that we do.

So, if specific words can help us to understand concepts and broaden our knowledge and understanding of the world, it is worth spending some time learning some new, and interesting words.

Here are 15 interesting words to get you started on the journey to crafting a more varied and effective vocabulary.

1. Logophile

I am assuming that as you are reading this article, you may be something of a logophile or ‘lover of words’. Logophile comes from the Greek ‘logos’ meaning speech and ‘phile’ meaning lover or friend.

2. Quixotic

This interesting word is derived from the lead character in Don Quixote written by Miguel de Cervantes. In the novel, Quixote decides to become a knight in order to defend the helpless and destroy the wicked.

Because of this character, we call someone Quixotic if they are unrealistically optimistic or have a comically chivalrous approach to life.

Interestingly, the word scrooge was coined in the same way, a scrooge being a mean person and coming from the character Scrooge in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

3. Liminal

Liminal means on the edge of things or between things. It describes marshy landscapes that are neither really land or sea. However, it can also be used to describe states of consciousness. Dreams often occur in the liminal state between sleeping and waking.

4. Esoteric

The word esoteric is used to describe special knowledge that is available only to a select group of people. Belief systems that rely on secret information and practices are often described as esoteric.

Examples of esoteric doctrines include Masonic Lodges, the Theosophical Society, and the Eleusinian mysteries.

5. Numinous

Numinous is a delightful word that means spiritual or supernatural. The word can be applied to anything that is mysterious or surpasses our human understanding.

6. Epistemology

Epistemology is the study of knowledge. This branch of philosophy is specifically concerned with the origin, nature, methods, and limits of human knowledge. So, I guess it really describes the process of thinking about thinking.

7. Schadenfreude

Though schadenfreude is a lovely sounding word, feeling it is not something to be proud of. Schadenfreude means experiencing pleasure or satisfaction from the trouble, failure or humiliation of others.

8. Loquacious

Most of us know someone who is a little loquacious. They talk – a lot! Unfortunately, most of the things they talk about are interesting only to them. This makes them the worst person to get stuck with at a dinner party.

9. Hubris

Hubris is a concept that originated in ancient Greece and today describes excessive presumption, exaggerated pride or self-confidence – even arrogance. It’s a shame that such a nice word describes such a horrible personality trait.

10. Bibliophile

A Bibliophile is a lover of books. The word comes from the Greek biblion ‘book’ + philos ‘lover or friend’. Bibliophiles have a particular interest in beautiful or rare books and many also collect antiques and first editions.

11. Eurhythmic

Eurhythmic means having an aesthetically pleasing rhythm or structure. So, I guess that’s what makes it the perfect name for a band.

12. Fugacious

Fugacious means fleeting or transient. It is similar to the even more attractive ephemeral, which means lasting a very short time.

Many things in life are beautiful but fleeting, the life of a mayfly, the moment the sun goes down on a glorious summer’s day, or the brief time a rainbow decorates the sky. Perhaps it is their fugacious nature that makes these moments so special.

13. Elysian

If something is elysian, it is blissful or delightful. The word comes from the Greek “Elysian field,” where the heroic and the virtuous go after death. So, I suppose it is similar to heavenly.

14. Metanoia

Metanoia describes a profound, usually spiritual, transformation. This unusual word perfectly describes the process of changing one’s mind, heart, spiritual direction, or way of life in a radical way.

This seems like a good word to use instead of the overused ‘enlightened’ or ‘spiritual awakening‘.

15. Lollygag

Lollygag is my favorite new interesting word. It means to spend time in an aimless or lazy way, to idle about or goof off. So, I guess lollygagging is the perfect way to spend an afternoon.

So that’s enough interesting words for today. I am off to spend the afternoon lollygagging.

We’d love to hear your favourite interesting words. Please share them with us in the comments.

References:

1. www.collinsdictionary
2. www.oed.com