Good afternoon. Breathe, release, and let go, into a relaxed body. That’s how I start every session, because it’s true here too: before we talk about anything else, we settle in.
Today’s topic is one I’ve carried with me for over three decades: my word is my law.
I first came across that phrase in 1991, in a book called The Game of Life and How to Play It by Florence Scovel Shinn. I bought my copy from a publishing company that no longer exists, and a year later I picked up a pack of affirmation cards from a little store in Dallas. I still remember exactly where I was standing. That’s how deep this went in.
The chapter is called “The Power of the Word.” Page 22. And the line that changed everything for me is this: a person who understands the power of their word becomes very careful of their conversation.
You Are Speaking Your Reality Into Existence
Here’s what most people don’t realize, you are manifesting constantly, whether you mean to or not.
If you’re walking around saying “this always happens to me,” “nobody’s there for me,” “I never catch a break”, you’re not describing your life. You’re building it. Every time you speak from lack, scarcity, and poverty consciousness, you strengthen the very reality you’re trying to escape.
And it goes further than the obvious complaints. Worry does the same thing. When you’re anxious about an outcome that hasn’t even happened yet, you are projecting that energy outward, and you’ll magnetize the very situation you were dreading. “I hope this doesn’t happen to me” becomes the seed of it happening to you.
This is the trap: you live in anxiety, fear, and doubt, the outcome you feared shows up, and your ego says, “See? This always happens to me.” That confirmation isn’t proof you were right. It’s proof of the payoff, the unconscious, neurochemical addiction to recreating a feeling you’re used to, even when that feeling is pain.
The Words You Don’t Even Notice You’re Saying
I had a breakthrough with a man recently. He realized his parents had planted money talk in his head decades ago, talk that had been sabotaging him ever since. His dialogue with money wasn’t conducive to creating it. So instead of creating money, he created debt. Instead of building wealth, he built worry about debt and interest. That’s not bad luck. That’s a cycle, and it’s the same cycle most of the planet lives inside without ever questioning it.
Here’s an exercise I give people constantly. Take a sticky note. Write down the three words most Americans say without even noticing:
Kind of
Guess
I don’t know
Put it somewhere you’ll see it all day. I watched a man on Instagram say “kind of” in almost every sentence, he had no idea. That’s the point. Once it’s in front of your eyes, you start catching yourself mid-sentence.
Pay attention to “I don’t know.” People don’t say it as an answer anymore, they say it as punctuation. It becomes one word: “I dunno, I dunno, I dunno.” And when you say it enough, it stops being a phrase and becomes a belief: I don’t know. I’m in doubt. I can’t figure it out. I’m not smart enough.
Words are law. If you keep saying it, you keep proving it.
Getting Out of Denial
The way out isn’t to grit your teeth and “get over it.” It’s to separate your feelings from the events that shaped them, and get a clear understanding of cause and effect. It’s to become acutely aware of your own word choices.
Part of that awareness is admitting the pattern for what it is. When someone tells me a story about why they keep doing something self-defeating, I’ll ask them to just say it plainly: “I’m an addict.” Not as an insult, as a doorway. The moment you can admit that truth, you’re no longer in denial. And communication that lives in denial is communication that lives in “I don’t know” and “this doesn’t make sense.” The more you say something doesn’t make sense, the more it won’t.
Change Your Words, Change Your Life
This is the whole practice: as you change your words, you change your results. You change your actions. You change your outcomes. You change your perspective. You change what you project, and what you project is what you attract.
Words are law.
— Jeffery Combs, President & Founder, Golden Mastermind Seminars, Inc. If you are seriously seeking a coach, contact Jeffery for a complimentary 20 minute session at 209-649-1562.
(The book that started it all: The Game of Life and How to Play It, by Florence Scovel Shinn.)