In Part One we discussed the idea that the meanings of words and phrases one hears are first translated and interpreted by their individual belief system, and then show up as feelings based on such. In Part Two, we looked at this through the perspective of sales.
In a discussion on my Facebook page regarding the sales aspect, the awesome Dondi Scumaci, author of the terrific new book, Career Moves wrote, “We absolutely must talk about what we are and what we can do! There is a positive frame (not spin) for every message.”
What a great example of words that literally mean about the same thing, yet bring forth two very different emotions. Actually, I guess the word, “frame” is, itself somewhat emotionless. You can frame something positively and that’s fine. Ahh, but “spin” is different, isn’t it? Politicians, big corporations and PR firms are known to “spin the…truth”, right? And, even if you say “positive spin” it still means (or feels like) it’s really a “lie with some dressing on it.”
Here’s a cool example, in my opinion, of wordpower. I was on the telephone with my great friend, Dr. Mollie Marti, who is the creator of Best Life Design. This was when she was first putting it all together. As she shared with me her concept I became very excited about it and said, “That’s awesome, Dr. Mollie; I’m going to help you promote it to death!” She paused for a moment and then asked, “would it be okay if, instead, we promoted it to life?” 🙂
Ha! What a great point. Why would we want to promote something to death? Do we want to kill it?
It reminds me of the first time I was honored to share the platform with one of my heroes, Mr. Zig Ziglar. As my name was announced and I began to head onto the stage, he said, “Knock em’ alive.”
WOW, knock em’ alive! Of course; much better than knocking your audience…er…dead. 🙂
Of course, sometimes it comes down to semantics. And, yet, semantics can be important. Not only in how others interpret what we say, but in how we interpret what we say. If we tell ourselves something is a problem, it probably is. If we tell ourselves something is a situation, we’ll look at it a bit differently. If we tell ourselves something is an opportunity, we’ll look at it, and respond to it, a whole lot differently, and in a way that helps us to live in the solution.
Would love your thoughts, opinions and suggestions about what we’ve been discussing.
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I agree! When I reflect back on wanting to move from where I was living about 4 years ago, I often would say, “I want to move from here in the worst way!” Lo and behold, that’s exactly what happened – I moved from where I was living in the WORST way possible, i.e, was laid-off, then I was having physical problems that prevented me from working all together, which then left me with no income, which in turn put me in the position to be evicted from my apartment, having my car repossessed, and having to move back home with my mother at the age of 39 – all after being totally self-supporting. It was an extremely humbling and humiliating experience for me, to say the least.
That experience, as well as others, have illustrated the power that my words carry.
I now make a conscious effort to choose my words more wisely, more often than not.
So fun being taken back to that convo, Bob! I remember your laughter as you processed my question and then you sharing your memory of that fabulous support you received as a young speaker from the great Zig Ziiglar.
Thrilled to be featuring you at our Best Life Design TeleSummit next week and then join you at your brilliant XBM! Let’s knock em’ ALIVE! 🙂
Iman, that is very powerful. Thank you, my friend, for sharing something with us that obviously was very painful and is very personal.
Dr. Mollie, yes, I remember that well. Must have laughed over that for a good five minutes! 🙂 You’re a great coach! Let’s knock em’ ALIVE indeed!
Words are indeed important as they can shape attitudes. Years ago in my corporate life, I was assigned to a group which had a bad reputation. Some of the negativity was justified…a lot of it was due to lack of understanding between the groups and their objectives.
After hearing what was said – things like “The problem is they don’t understand our business!” or “I just can’t figure out why they want that product when what we have is perfectly fine.”
I immediately tried to take the word ‘problem’ out of the vocabulary and replace it with ‘challenge’ and/or ‘opportunity’. Rephrase your THOUGHTS by saying “My challenge is to get them to understand how our biz works in relationship to their objectives.” or “We have the opportunity to better understand our (internal) clients’ needs in order to source product which better meets their needs.”
I’d say this effort was moderately effective but it did indeed start to change a few attitudes here and there, both within my group and with our ‘internal’ customers.
Hi Bob
Thank you for another thought-provoking post.
We share a mutual appreciation of the work of Tom Hopkins, and I still use the positive affirmation card set that I wrote out just after I read his books and listened to his audio tapes “The Champions Guide to Selling Anything” and “The Official Guide to Success”.
Most of the cards have been recycled or the words altered to fit the situation but it is amazing how, in a few fairly tight situations, I have found my subconscious pulling to the forefront of my mind some of the great pearls of wisdom of Tom. One of my absolute favourites is: “I think positive because positive is success and that is the side I always want to be on”.
I think if you can reframe the situation by construing the situation in a positive way – flipping is perhaps a good way to think of this – then it really helps mentally/spiritually get through a situation. Finally, it is important to bear in mind what the late Jim Rohn said: positive affirmations without more are the first sign of someone who is delusional. I fully endorse that – there is no point not walking the talk as otherwise you will have no chance of changing your focus for the long term.
Best wishes.
Julian
For as many years as I can remember, Cindy has been sending me on my way to this meeting or that with the phrase “Knock ’em happy.” (Now I’m wondering whether there’s also a better word for “knock”!)
Hi Julian, thank you for sharing. Tom Hopkins and Jim Rohn, and so many others, have done so much to help all of us become better and more effective human beings.
Gill, I’m pretty sure that if Cindy says it…it’s perfect as is! 🙂