by Lynn Marie Sager
How powerful are words and their definitions?
I remember an anthropology book that I read in college about a Pacific island called Rotuma. This tiny island has a large mountain range, causing one side of the island to be geographically isolated from the other. Before Rotuma’s “discovery” in the 1800′s, the island was highly populated and both sides of the island got along tolerably well. Until one day, when Catholic missionaries landed on one side of the island and began translating the bible into Rotuman. Their translation might not have been a bad thing, except that around this same time, Congregationalist missionaries landed on the other side of the island and began their own translation of the bible into Rotuman. The Rotuman language has a number of words that mean divine. The Catholics chose one word to stand for “God” and arbitrarily chose another to mean the “Devil.” As fate would have it, the word they chose to mean the “Devil” was the same word the Congregationalists chose to mean “God.” Within a short time, rumor spread that the people on the other side of the island were practicing devil worship. As a result, war broke out between the two sides of the island.
People die over words all the time.
Words, and the meanings we assign them, have power. Definitions give meaning to life. Words will continue to define you unless you take the time to define them. So, if your life lacks meaning, maybe it’s because you’ve neglected to define what your life means. If you accept without question, any definition, belief, or perception handed to you, then you limit your life to the truths and beliefs discovered by other people. You kill the one thing that is uniquely your own-your perspective. Your life will become some vague shadow of something that someone else defined years ago. Or, even worse, you may never really understand what those people who defined your language, centuries ago, meant. Everything in your life will seem just as hollow as the words you take for granted.
What’s the bottom line on definitions and belief?
The most fundamental changes in life happen when we redefine who we are. When we see ourselves differently, we think differently. When we think differently, we feel differently. When we feel differently, we behave differently, and we don’t need some quick-fix technique to control ourselves, or others. So open your mind and explore your definitions. Your life will expand proportionately…
From A River Worth Riding: Fourteen Rules for Navigating Life, by Lynn Marie Sager Copyright 2005.You can find more about the power of belief on Navigating Life’s website. Simply go to http://www.navigatinglife.org and visit boarding for links to our full lessons, techniques, and exercises for expanding beliefs.
Lynn Marie Sager has toured over two-dozen countries and worked on three continents. Author of A River Worth Riding: Fourteen Rules for Navigating Life, Lynn currently lives in California; where she fills her time with private coaching, public speaking, and teaching for the LACCD and Pierce College. She runs the Navigating Life website, where she offers free assistance to readers who wish to incorporate the rules of worthwhile living into their lives. To read more about how you can use these rules to improve your life, visit Lynn’s website at http://www.navigatinglife.org
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