Heya playa, do you say the words F---, S---, C----, A--, and, B---- a lot?
Well, that's the question that Jacob asked me when he said "I got into the bad habit
of swearing and I want to stop.
Can you please give me some tips on how to stop swearing?".
Don't worry Jacob, we all kind of fall into this rut but I do have a few practical tips
that you can put into play to help you stop swearing.
This is The Josh Speaks.
You're watching The Josh Speaks.
For those of you that are new here, my name is Josh and every single Monday through Friday
I make videos sharing tips, ideas and stories teaching you how to be your best self and
today I want to dive deeper into the idea of cursing.
Why do we do it so much and how do we make ourselves stop?
The interesting thing about cursing is that we generally tend to pick up the usage of
certain words because we hear them so often and so frequently.
I mean when you really think about it, curses are just words.
They don't really have any actual power to them.
If I were to say a curse to you in a completely different language that you didn't know, would
you be offended by it?
Most likely you wouldn't care because that word has no real meaning to you.
It only gains a meaning when you're able to attach it to language that you already understand.
So for many, there are a few different key places that people tend to pick up the specific
curse words that they use.
Sometimes it can be from your family, or your friends or from the media that you watch or
just from life in general.
So if you feel like your parents and siblings are some of the major influences as to why
you curse, you might want to institute some type of swear jar in your house.
Every time you end up swearing, put five or ten cents into that jar.
Now here's the thing, no one else in your house may choose to abide by these rules but
setting it up and you abiding by it, at least you're making the effort to curb yourself
or at least to be aware of when you're cursing.
Now hopefully your parents get on board with this but sometimes adults find it a lot harder
because the way that they speak is so baked into how they are.
So because you're young, you can actually start making that difference early on.
For most of you though, I would assume that the environment that normalizes cursing the
most would be around your friends and at school.
People in school and your friends just don't have a reason to stop doing it so why would
they?
Sadly, I don't think the swear jar method would really work with your friends.
You're gonna need to find another alternative to help curb their behavior and to curb your
own.
Now for this, there is a trick that you can use because one of my friends instituted it
for himself and was actually able to change the way that he spoke.
And that's simply to find replacement words for the curses that you use.
For one of my friends, the word he had gotten so accustomed to using, and I'm only going
to use it here for context purposes is the word "faggot".
He would call everyone that word, he would use it at the end of his sentences.
It just became so natural and part of his language but he knew he wanted to change that.
Not only did he feel like one day he was going to use that word with the wrong person and
get punched in the face, he also knew that it just wasn't a nice word and a good thing
to say.
So the replacement word that he found was the word "sir".
It is a pretty weird transition to go from saying that F word to the word "sir".
I started to hear him say things like "yo what up sir?", "How you doing sir?", "Man,
you're such a sir".
And I think the reason why it was such an effective change was because not only did
he tell us he was going to do it but, by making such a drastic word change he was able to
kind of mentally prepare himself whenever he said it.
He became super aware of how often he would say that word without even thinking about
it, but now that he said the word "sir", he realized he said it way too often and he just
found it ridiculous so he eventually just dropped the whole thing altogether.
And that was the crazy thing, he stopped cursing as much despite the fact that all of our friends
continued to curse in the same way.
He was able to become more aware of saying that word and hearing that word from other
people, and that's how he prevented himself from saying it.
So for you, that curse word might be anything else but I would take the same strategy here,
try to replace that word in your mind and be hyper-aware of whenever you hear it and
whenever you say it so you can really make that change.
One place you can't control it though is if you're constantly hearing it in things like
movies or tv shows, those are places you're just going to have to deal with it but if
you're hyper-aware of whenever you're using it, you'll be more sensitive to how often
you curse and to what you actually say.
What do you think though, do you curse a lot?
Is it something you feel like you want to stop doing?
Leave your comments down below and we'll talk about it.
But putting aside the "F-Bombs" for now, if you do have something you want to talk to
me about in a more private setting, you can always shoot me a DM over on Snapchat or Instagram.
I do my best to answer as many messages as I can.
But anyway, thank you so much for watching.
If you enjoyed this video hit the thumbs up button and if you're new here, make sure to
click the subscribe button so you can see my new videos whenever I post them.
Also, check out the videos I have over there on the side if you want to keep learning how
to kind of mentally prepare yourself to not make these mistakes, how to not say bad words
how to not curse as much, I have videos over there that will definitely help you out.
On that note, I'll see you guys next time, as always love and peace.