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Comment by aaron-lebo | Hacker News Reader

The author says that you can't intentionally modify your language to change who you are, but there's not much depth to that section.

I can't help but to wonder if you really can "fake it until you make it". If you force yourself to write in a more "powerful" manner, could that not cause people to perceive you as such and therefore boost your confidence to where you really are that person?

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It is possible.

Robert Anton Wilson in one or two of his books gives an exercise similar to this - consciously choosing to remove all absolutes from your conversations. Something like never saying "I am tired" but rather "I feel tired" and not saying "That is bad" but rather "That activity has badness in it" or something like that! Edits - it's called E-Prime and mentioned in another comment in this thread.

The point is that it would be possible to do it, but it would be very difficult and initially very strange.

E-prime feels more difficult than the exercise hinted at here, namely, removing all trace of first person identity from one's communications. (Though years of intermittently practicing the latter might have had an impact here...)

Combining the two at length seems ferociously difficult.

RAW's 'Quantum psychology' is probably the best distillation of those ideas. At first sight it seems like a bunch of hand-waving hippy nonsense, but underneath are some actionable and practical techniques for improving critical thinking and self-directed neuro-linguistic programming (though I can't remember whether he uses that specific term).

Sure you can consciously make an effort to drop the word I, and suggestive/passive words such as as "Think, Perhaps, May, Maybe, Should, Could, etc..." It is easier in writing, but even in real time conversations, one can pause before answering and think of which words to add/remove before speaking.

The added benefit of the Pause is that it makes you look more thoughtful, hence smarter.

Getting into this habit also means you can choose to express personal opinions or make passive statements to reflect genuine uncertainty and distinguish guesses from fact.

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