Can we think without words?

From Thirty Days to a More Power Vocabulary

Wilfred Funk and Norman Lewis

The study of words is not merely something that has to do with literature. Words are your tools of thought. You can’t even think at all without them. Try it. If you are planning to go downtown this afternoon you will find that you are saying to yourself ”I think I will go downtown this afternoon.” You can’t make such a simple decision as this without using words.

Without words you could make no decisions and form no judgments whatsoever. A pianist may have the most beautiful tunes in his head, but if he had only five keys on his piano he would never get more than a fraction of these tunes out.

Your words are your keys for your thoughts. And the more words you have at your command the deeper, clearer and more accurate will be your thinking.

A command of English will not only improve the processes of your mind. It will give you assurance; build your self-confidence; lend color to your personality; and increase your popularity.

Your words are your personality. Your vocabulary is you. Your words are all that we, your friends, have to know and judge you by. You have no other medium for telling us your thoughts – for convincing us, persuading us, giving us orders.