It’s Just A Little 4 Letter Word.
What Effect Could It Possibly Have?
Today I want to talk about a little word. It’s a little word that we’re all guilty of misusing from time to time. But it actually has really BIG consequences when we misuse it. It’s a word that we use all the time, we use it every day, but do we ever stop to really think about what it is that we’re really saying when we say it. What is that word? The word is “Just”.
So What Does "Just" Mean?
Well, basically, “Just” is a way of minimising or making things seem smaller, perhaps less important than what they really are. Think about advertising, they do this all the time. When they want to make something seem less, like price for example, they say it’s JUST $99.95 or it’s JUST 4 easy payments. An air mattress takes JUST seconds to inflate or somethings else takes JUST minutes to install. What about gym equipment? You can look like ‘The Rock’ in JUST minutes per day, when you’re done it JUST folds away! They want the $99.95 or whatever it is to seem less, to take the attention away from that.
Have you ever seen an add for a cruise ship? It’s JUST $1,800 for a 5 night cruise! Wait a minute… Which is more, 5 or 1800? Have you ever heard a cruise line say for $1,800 you get JUST 5 nights? NO! It’s always 5 nights for JUST $1,800. Because they want the price you pay to seem less, not what you get for it!
Unfortunately, this is something that we’re also guilty of doing to ourselves when we use the word “Just” to describe ourselves or something that we do. Back when I was working in the Corporate World, I remember one of the Managers in our company was called Louise. Whenever she called our internal line she’d always say “Hi, it’s just Louise calling…” but whenever she spoke to my boss, my boss would always correct her and say “It’s not JUST Louise, it IS Louise!”.
This is something that we need to do for ourselves. You’re not JUST you, you ARE you! We need to take ownership of this, we need to take pride in ourselves, we need to stop lessening the importance of who we are. So why don’t we?
We don’t because we’re afraid of being seen as big noting ourselves. We’re afraid if we put our best foot forward, then perhaps the world won’t think we’re as good as we truly are. At work, if we just podge along doing the absolute minimum, nobody takes any notice, and it’s often good to not get noticed at work because at least it means that we’re not offending anyone, no once is complaining and we’re just flying under the radar. If we really excel at work, then we’re going to get noticed, we’re going to ruffle a few feathers, and that’s not what we want!
We hate the idea of anyone saying, “Oh boy, he really loves himself” or “she’s really up herself” or anything like that. The second aspect is that we feel as though if we say how good we really are and then aren’t able to live up to that for any reason, we feel like a fake, like we’ve been making promises that we’re unable to live up to.
For that reason, we’re psychologically inclined, without even realising it, to trying to down play our own significance. To try and lower other people’s expectation of us, so as not to disappoint or seem too pompous.
Of course, the downside of this is that everybody loses. It does not serve us to try and lessen our own significance, worth or brilliance. Furthermore it deprives others of the benefit of what they could have gained from us at our very best.
Whenever I hear someone say “It’s just me” it makes me think of the famous quote…
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond all measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people will not feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone and as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
~ Marianne Williamson.
So you need to be conscious of your self-talk. You need to talk yourself up, not put yourself down. When I say talk yourself up, I’m not talking about being arrogant or thinking that you’re better than anyone else. I’m talking about seeing yourself as being EQUAL with everyone else and not less, not inferior.
Have some fun with this. Think of ways that you can introduce yourself or reference yourself that paints you in the positive way that you deserve to be seen. I once worked with a guy who had a very fun and innovative way of announcing himself whenever he called someone in our company on an internal line. (I won’t use his name or the name of the company we worked for lol, let’s just say John Smith from ABC Company). Whenever he called someone, when they answered he’d say, “Yes, it’s the Great John Smith of ABC Company fame here!”
Think of situations where you maybe put yourself down. Ask the question, why do you do that? What are you afraid of? What are you trying to avoid? Now ask yourself, what do you really bring to the table in this instance? What is it about you that makes you so good at this? How do other people benefit because of what you’re able to do?
Now that you know all that, have some fun and think of some fun ways that you can reference yourself, without being arrogant or conceited, that allows people to see you in the way that you deserve to be Seen?
Leave me some comments to let me know how you go with this…