that is.You are totally involved with language; words direct
your whole life.
       Someone calls you a “stupid fool.” You react emotion-
ally, and through that reaction you come to believe you are
a fool. In your emotional bonding, words are the same as the
thing they stand for, so you have no resistance against what
they imply.
       You feel inferior simply because you have reacted in
an inferior way. It is the compulsion to react that lowers you,
and now the words fit the condition that the wicked spirit
behind the words wanted to create. So you compensate; you
try to prove that you are not a fool. You labor to hear
words of praise. You try to make people undo with com-
pliments the hurt that degrading words have inflicted on you.
       You’ve spent a lot of time seeking praise and approval
to make people take their words back, to “eat” their words.
But what happens if you succeed in making others praise
you or tell you how wonderful you are? You will just be be-
lieving words again—lies—because you are not wonderful.
You stopped being wonderful when you stopped listening
to and believing what is right deep down in your heart, and
all the praise in the world cannot put Humpty-Dumpty to-
gether again.
       The problem, again, is very simple.You tend to believe
in words more than in your true original self. If you resent
the implications of words, the trauma of doing so turns you
into what you resent. React and believe that you are stu-
pid, and you are stupid. You’re stupid for believing that
you’re stupid! Believing is a thing of compulsion—of faith
or of sin. It is the sin state of believing that we need to be

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