Learning to say what you mean, well, is no easy feat. But it can be done. It took me one year to do my best to remove the word "don't" from my vocabulary. As I was learning how to do this, I challenged my nieces and nephews to catch me saying "don't" when I was visiting. It was a fun exercise, and well, one of my nephews always got me to say the word "don't". I even offered them a quarter every time I said it. Well, he got me to say it but I ran out of quarters. He still played the game with me regardless. He has autism, is adopted and the oldest of my nieces and nephews. Six nieces and nephews are step, but I see them as family. Four of them are adopted all brothers and sisters and all four have some form of the autism spectrum. Then there are my two nephews (and one niece from a previous marriage). So, my brother has all together nine children. Yes, big family. I only have two children. Now, what does this have to do with saying what you mean? I has everything to do with it.
You see, when my son was four years old, I put him through a pre-school that was also a parenting class. In this class the instructor challenged us parents to say what we mean. For example, when you say, "don't touch that!" it is confusing to the four year old, because they have to process why you said that. Instead of saying that, the instructor says that if you say, "leave that alone" it is better. So, if they are touching a radio button for example. If you say, "don't touch that" then a different button might be okay. But if you say to, "leave that alone", well, then the other buttons might need to be left alone as well.
To compound my troubles, I decided to see if there were more words that I could eliminate from my vocabulary. I decided to try to eliminate all contractions from my vocabulary. I am still working on that. But imagine if you are being kissed and you want them to stop. You might say, "no. don't. stop." But they might hear, "No, don't stop." You see how it can get confusing? So, I say to get them to stop is, "I want you to stop." Period. Less confusing right? You might even come up with a better one. That's okay. It takes time to get away from negativity and the best part is that the thing that I am tackling currently is oxymorons. Instead of, "That's awfully pretty." I now can say, "That is really pretty." Big diff...gf.