Is it bad to use “phoney words” in your vocabulary?
“They’re grand people.” “Yes, they are. They’re very nice.” Grand. There’s a word I really hate. It’s a phony. I could puke every time I heard it”.
This dialog I read from “The Catcher in the Rye” this morning. We throw words around so easily these days. We twist meanings and overuse them. Before you know it, all of the meaning and life gets sucked out and we are left with people with lips that only speak empty words.
When I was fifteen, I realized I did this myself. I was friends with the harmonica player of the bar band and he was complaining how the young generation overused the word “awesome”.
“The party was so awesome. My gosh this is such an awesome drink. It kind of depresses me. I’ll teach you what is awesome. The Grand Canyon is awesome…. A sunrise is awesome. It had so much more power and now you use it to fill silence. I try to only use it when I mean it.”
I suppose that was his own little way to contribute to the preservation of the English language.
I did not instantly start choosing my words carefully. Slang is slang and it becomes such a habit. Changing from such comfortable usage to carefully choosing your words can be challenging for most.
It shows how you think and what kind of person you are. They say speech is where the body and soul meet. Which is why you must always be careful with what you say because it effects every aspect of your life. Your words become thoughts- your thoughts shape your reality.
So! As of soon, I would like to remove “phoney” words from my vocabulary if I do not mean them.
My list would probably look like:
- Awesome
- Great
- Busy
- Fun
- Exciting
- Amazing
- Good
- Epic
- Cool
- Neat
- Crazy
- Okay
- Whatever
- Forever
What are your phoney words?
Johnna Slaby 