Historically, they did it through violence. Or through the threat of violence. 

But you can’t get away with that kind of stuff anymore. At least not in this country. 

And if the truth be known, people like that don’t have to use or threaten violence anymore to control your actions. All they have to do now is control your thinking. 

And they do that by manipulating you through words. Generally in one of two ways: 

1. They tell you what they want you to believe is happening, rather than what is really happening. 

2. What they say is very much like a jigsaw puzzle that’s blank on both sides — the words fit together perfectly, but there’s no message. 

But that’s not all there is to it. You see, we tend to make choices in life based on what other people say. And because garbage-in always results in garbage-out, when we allow ourselves to be manipulated through words, our choices turn out to be bad ones. 

However, there is a solution. All you have to do is hold up whatever you’re told to the light of your own experience. If it makes sense, accept it into your database of reliable information. If it doesn’t, get rid of it. 

But please know that even with this new-found protection against the verbal garbage that permeates the world of words, you’re still going to make mistakes from time to time. You can’t help it. That’s the nature of life. But at least they’ll be your mistakes. 

And you’ll grow from them. Because they’ll stem from your view of the world, not from someone else’s. 

Now that’s important. Because you can no more grow from someone else’s view of the world than you can breathe using someone else’s lungs. 

Think about it.