You might have heard about the new word ‘dû’ or (dûing, dô, dôes, dîd). I thought I’d write a short piece to explain what it is and why you might want to use it. If you want more information and fuller details and instructions on how to use it, then the ‘dû’ book is the place to go.
When listening to people talking about the problems in their lives you can often hear what I call ‘passive statements’.
“I am stressed by the state of the economy” is a good example of this; it’s ‘passive’ because there’s not much they can do about their stress until the economy improves or time passes. So in effect they seem to be left powerless by circumstances that are beyond their control, and there is a sense of being stuck with the problem.
I’ve always been interested in finding new ways to look at things; these passives seemed to make people suffer and make life more difficult for them. It didn’t seem fair that people had to put up with these kinds of situations and problems. Clearly neither they or I could change the things like the world economy, but I wondered, would it help to turn this passive into an active?
There just didn’t seem to be an easy way of doing this using existing words, so I had to create a new word to describe this change.
To change ‘I am stressed’
From a passive to an active, we need to use the new verb dû (dûing, dô, dôes, dîd).
It has a similar meaning to ‘do’ except the û signifies that although the person is involved in this situation at some level, that involvement is at an unconscious and unintentional level. So they are not to blame for it any anyway, but because they are involved, they do have the power to influence what happens next.
So I am stressed
becomes
I am dûing stress
People often feel that when they say it this way it’s almost as though a little gap appears in the way we see things. Suddenly a new possibility appears that maybe we don’t have to be powerless, maybe we can stop dûing stress and instead start doing (consciously and intentionally) something that will make our lives better.
So that’s a basic introduction to dû; its applications seem to be endless. Have a go at starting to use it in your life and see the difference it can make.
All the best
Phîl
Here’s a video of the first ever lecture about the dû.