Words are powerful. Just as certain languages can bring positive energy, one theory claims there’s a specific language more likely to bring negative energy into a person’s life without them even realizing it.
The language that we use in our everyday lives truly does dictate how we think, feel, and process different situations. In a video, a content creator named Quynh explained that speaking English can actually make people more negative, and it all has to do with how the English language describes emotions.
“What if English makes us more negative? The way that we talk about emotions is how we get stuck in them. In English, we say, I am sad, I am depressed, I am anxious, I am angry. But in other languages, the direct translation correlates to their mental well-being,” Quynh began in her video.
She explained that in Arabic, for example, the phrasing translates to “sadness is passing through me.” In Russian, it translates to “to me, it is sad,” and in Spanish, it’s, “I am in a state of sadness.”
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When describing emotion in other languages, it’s something being done to them or occurring around them. It’s talked about as if it’s the weather, as if a cloud is just passing over and the rain will eventually stop. The emotion does not define the person. It’s a state that’s happening to them for a moment, and it creates a much healthier mental state than how English conveys emotion.
“It is psychology. There is a field called linguistic relativity that studies how the way that we speak actually habitually changes and shapes how we think. Not completely, not deterministically, but subtly,” Quynh continued.
“If your language constantly equates your emotions with identity,”Quynh explained, “it may be easier to internalize those temporary states.”
Rather than saying we’re experiencing anxiety, we usually say that we’re feeling anxious. Rather than saying that the timing isn’t right for something or that the moment is misaligned, as they may say in Arabic, we tend to say “I’m wrong” or “I have failed.”
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That small linguistic difference creates distance, and that distance creates perspective. It doesn’t mean that English is inherently evil, but that the structures we depend on every single day shape the narrative that we have of ourselves. The shift isn’t about learning a new language.
Instead, it’s about just changing how we talk about our emotions. Trying different syntax to express your emotional state might help you confront that emotion and eventually come to terms with it. It usually takes about 90 seconds for us to metabolize an emotion, at least according to neurosomatic nervous system expert Melissa Romano.
“When people say you gotta learn to sit with it, they don’t mean sit with it for days,” Romano said. “Sit with what your body feels like doing in that moment, sit with how it feels inside your body in that moment, and if you can conjure the vocabulary using something like an emotions wheel, you can name it.”
A mix of using different descriptors for what you’re feeling and learning how to really sit with an emotion can make the biggest difference in being able to heal and move on. After all, emotions staying in the body will only do us a disservice.
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Nia Tipton is a staff writer with a bachelor’s degree in creative writing and journalism who covers news and lifestyle topics that focus on psychology, relationships, and the human experience.
