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Three Weak Words

May 3, 2016 | Semantics | 0 comments

I have always felt like “I feel like” as a phrase was disingenuous:

Writing in The New York Times, Molly Worthen, an assistant professor of history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, calls out the three words you should stop using:

“I feel like … ”

They’re weak words, weasel words, conflict-avoiding words. Words that we use when we don’t have the courage of our convictions, and we’d rather hedge our bets and say something in a calculated way that sacrifices certainty for safety.

And yet, they’re common–and only becoming more so. I’m sure you see it in your work and in your life. People who are afraid simply to say what they mean, and feel instead that they have to couch their convictions with language about how they feel.

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