Noticing how many times I said ‘I’ was interesting. I did this challenge a couple of days ago because I am away this weekend. I was working from home. So, most of my interactions were with my family, except for a couple of calls with clients.
As I was working from home, I decided to include the written word too. Bearing in mind it was not a very social day, I was surprised when I had pushed through three figures just after lunchtime. I was only counting roughly throughout the day and stopped after dinner. I estimate I was well past 200. What I also noticed how often other people say ‘I’. I am not sure my brain could have coped with counting those as well. My gut feel is that the ratio would have been something like 1:1.5 i.e. I was hearing 1.5 for every ‘I’ I was saying. I had a quick look and could not find any research on this. If you know of any, please drop me a comment below.
What I did discover was the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, otherwise known as frequency illusion or recency illusion. I think the best way to describe it is; say you have just purchased, or you are thinking of purchasing a new car. Suddenly, that car seems to be everywhere. This is the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon. You can find out more here. I think this is why I noticed how many times other people were using ‘I’ and maybe why my estimate is high?
One final thing that occurred to me whilst doing this challenge is one of my favourite quotes. Malcolm X is credited with saying, “When ‘I’ is replaced with ‘we’, even illness becomes wellness”.
Did you manage to tackle day 25 of #MindfulMay? What did you experience?
Be happy, healthy and helpful
Paul
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