For Better or Worse, Your Words Become Your Thoughts

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I still remember the first time I heard the word "bifurcated." It means "forked" or "diverging in two directions," and I had to look it up after hearing the late William F. Buckley use it during one of his magniloquent meditations on political philosophy.

"Don't you love listening to him talk?" I asked my friend. As it turned out, she did not. "What's the point of using big words if nobody knows what you're saying?"

It was a reasonable question. After all, if you mean "forked," why not just say "forked"?

But it's a question that would have made George Orwell cringe. His dystopian masterpiece, "1984," depicts how the totalitarian Party works to supplant English with Newspeak, a language that contains a vocabulary of only 200 words.

Impoverished language produces enfeebled thinking. Lacking a sufficiently broad range of words to draw from, our minds can neither formulate nor comprehend complex thoughts and ideas. The Party leaders in Orwell's foreboding future understood that even if people realized their lives were awful, a truncated vocabulary would prevent them from either articulating the source of their problems or conceptualizing solutions to fix them.

Life imitates art, and the relentless inertia of political correctness continues to muddy the meaning of some words while eliminating other words entirely. Ironically, the crusade to create a more respectful society has made us less polite, less refined and less aware. We take offense where none is given and give offense without noticing how or understanding why.

The obvious answer is to change direction. Rather than continuing to dumb down our speech and cognition, we need to tack in the opposite direction by employing a practice close to the heart of the Ethical Lexicon:

Neologize (ne*ol*o*gize/ nee-OL-uh-jahyz) verb To invent new words, coin fresh expressions or assign completely new meanings to existing words.

Let's not confuse neologizing with the prettified euphemisms mandated by the thought police. When we rebrand janitors as custodians, then maintenance men, then sanitation engineers, then industrial hygiene technicians, we increase neither clarity nor dignity. Instead, we promote a society terrified of calling things by their proper names while we reinforce stereotypes and social hierarchies.

Conversely, when we adopt new words like doomscroll, ghosting and hangry or when we redefine words like viral, cloud and troll, we keep our thinking in tune with shifting cultural trends and new social norms. Resurrecting old words that have fallen out of common use can prove equally beneficial.

Expanding our vocabulary doesn't merely allow us to compose more flowery sentences. It keeps our minds nimble and enables us to construct and express deeper, more nuanced and, occasionally, bifurcated ideas.

In our brave new world, "content consumers" increasingly parrot slogans they don't understand, spout factoids detached from reality and impulsively click away from perspectives that nudge them out of their comfort zones. By working to enhance and improve our capacity for communicating and understanding, we stem the erosion of language and resist the corruption of thought.

The roots of neologizing reach back thousands of years. The sages of ancient Judea identified four levels of creation: Inanimate, vegetable, animal and human. But they did not refer to mankind as "human." Instead, they labeled us "speakers."

It's true that animals possess rudimentary speech. Birds chirp to attract mates. Bees dance to give directions. Dogs and cats communicate emotion by purring or growling. But only human beings can exchange ideas; only we can share the complex musings of our hearts and achieve psychological intimacy through the baring of our souls.

All of this depends on our ability to exploit the medium of language. When we default to simplistic language and empty slogans, we aren't really communicating at all; we're just adding noise to the echo chambers of ideology. But when we cultivate an appreciation for the texture and subtlety of genuine eloquence, we expand our own intellectual potential and stimulate the minds of those around us.

As King Solomon says, "Like golden apples on a bed of silver is a word skillfully spoken."

Seeking new forms of expression doesn't replace conventional usage. It enables us to discern shades of meaning, achieve deeper clarity and promote the kind of authentic wisdom that contributes to a healthier and more harmonious world.

Rabbi Yonason Goldson is a nationally syndicated columnist, keynote speaker, award-winning podcast host, and executive coach with Vistage Worldwide, Inc. His observations on culture and ethics have been cited in Forbes, Time, Newsweek, and the Washington Post. He has given two TEDx Talks, published seven books, and serves as Executive Vice President of the Coalition for Jewish Values, Missouri Chapter. Visit him at ethicsninja.com.

Previously:

• What enables us to hold onto the past by compelling us to live in the present?
• Before we expect justice from others, we need to demand justice from ourselves
• Play allows our soul to thrive
• Get Outside your Head to Look Inside your Mind
• Seeking Peace Does Not Demand Surrender
• The real-world tragedy of Inexcusable Educational Malpractice
• Why do the willfully ignorant mutate into the most intransigent ideologues?
• More Dangerous than FOMO: The Fear of Not Being Missed
• Eyes wide shut
• Increase performance by turning into the wind
• Balancing the Equation of Intentions vs. Outcomes
• To be Human is to be Exceptional
• If You Get Where You're Going, You've Taken the Wrong Road
• Think Twice Before You Take Advice
• Taking intellectual humility seriously
• What are we?
• Are we Pillaging our own Moral Depository?
• Why Sharp Tongues Lose the War of Words
• Good Intentions Never Prevail Over Cold Reality
• Sarcastic Wit Carries Too High a Cost
• Character, not as a bank account. Rather, an investment portfolio
• Are We Programming Ourselves Out of Existence?
• The bigger they come, the harder we try to make them fall
• How to Transform Fallacies Into Actionable Reality
• How to make life worth living --- no, REALLY!
• What Do Opposites Attract? Truth and Wisdom
• Groucho Marx and Embracing Tension
• Toward a more civil civilization
• Break Down Barriers of Thought to Build Towers of Innovation
• 'Tis the Season for Reflecting Beyond your Reflection
• Why Antisemitism Is Not Just a Jewish Problem
• The rank stupidity of 'Just let it go'
• To create a functioning, biblically-based civilization
• The difference between optimism and hope
• The Next Piece of the Puzzle Might Fill the Hole in Your Heart
• Self-Esteem Isn't Given -- It's Earned
• Remember the Past to Promote a Successful Future
• Are We Making Failure the Price of Success?
• Demoralization Is More About Culture than Feelings
• The Lesson We're Missing From the Death of Charlie Kirk
• Invest in Your Own Success by Building Up Others
• The Most Valiant Heroes Fight on a Different Battlefield
• How Pundits Came to Give Punditry a Bad Name
• The Wisdom of Knowing What You Don't Know
• Success Thrives in the Light of Purpose and Passion
• When Seeking Peace, Don't Release the Dogs of War
• Greta Thunberg Sails Toward Moral Hypocrisy
• Checking More Boxes Is Not the Solution
• Why Sometimes NOT Seeing Is MORE Believing
• A Healthy Diet for the Brain Promotes Ethical Clarity for the Mind

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