The Lie

Prefer to Listen?

I was at dinner in Miami this week with a coworker. She was telling me about her landlord forcing her to move units, and somewhere in the middle of it she said, “I have the worst luck with housing.” Then, like a footnote, “Something like this happens every year.”

I asked her to try saying it the other way. You have excellent luck with housing.

She laughed at me. I meant it.

I've been noticing these sentences everywhere lately. My radar must be on. They slip out in the middle of ordinary conversations with coworkers, friends, family. No intention behind them. No motive. Just stated like fact.

A friend told me she doesn't belong at work. I've done it too. I'm a terrible sleeper. Sentences with always and never tucked inside them. Words that feel like identity when they're really just describing a moment.

Here's the tension I'm sitting with. What my coworker said about her housing is true. What my friend feels about belonging is real. I'm not asking anyone to pretend otherwise. But are the words we use to describe what happened training us to expect more of the same?

Say a thing enough and it paves a path.

So what if we said them in the affirmative? Not I'm working on my sleep. I'm a great sleeper. I have excellent luck with housing. I belong in rooms like this.

I've been trying mine for a few weeks now. I'm a great sleeper. The old version came with a sentence I had to serve. It had me up at two, then three, like clockwork.

Last night I slept straight through. No 2 a.m. or 3 a.m. My Oura ring shows one solid line. Is it working? I'd like to believe it is.

I felt a little ridiculous saying it across the table in that restaurant, and I'd guess my coworker is still deciding whether I'm serious. The sentence isn't true yet.

But the old one was a lie too. It was just older. At least this one is paving a path worth walking.

Thought for the Week: What's the one sentence you repeat about yourself that might not be as true as it sounds? What would happen if you said the opposite out loud, just for a week?