Call It What It Is: The Naming Method Explained

This is the core of how I work with people, so we need to talk about it.

The Naming Method is built on one principle: call it what it is, or it will always control you.

We can't heal what we don't face. When we avoid the truth, it quietly runs the show. Name it to tame it. The moment you face it, you take back your power.

When you're avoiding something, call it avoidance. When you're lying to yourself, call it a lie. When you're making a choice, call it a choice. When you're using substances to not feel things, call it numbing. When you're being a coward, call it cowardice.

Not as an insult. Not to beat yourself up. But because pretending something is something else gives it power over you.

People spend enormous energy dancing around the truth. They say "I can't" when they mean "I won't." They say "it just happened" when they made a choice. They say "I'm fine" when they're falling apart. They say "I need a drink to relax" when they're avoiding feeling anything.

All of that avoidance, all of that softening, all of those euphemisms and justifications and stories? That's what keeps you stuck.

You can't change what you won't name.

Here's a concrete example. Guy comes in, talks about his drinking. He tells me he drinks to unwind. To take the edge off. To relax after work. He's got a whole story about how stressful his job is, how he deserves to relax, how everyone drinks, how it's not a big deal.

Let's call it what it is. You're using alcohol to avoid dealing with stress, and it's not working because you wake up feeling worse and the stress is still there. You're choosing to drink every night even though it's making your life worse. That's not unwinding. That's avoidance, and it's not solving anything.

That might sound harsh, but it's also true. And now we can actually work with it. Now we're dealing with reality instead of the story he's been telling himself.

The Naming Method isn't about being mean. It's about being honest. It's about stripping away the bullshit so you can see what you're actually dealing with.

When you name something accurately, a few things happen.

First, it loses some of its power. Shame thrives in vagueness. Addiction thrives in euphemism. Avoidance thrives in justification. When you call things what they are, you take away their ability to hide.

Second, you can finally address it. You can't fix "I just need to relax more." But you can work with "I'm using alcohol to avoid dealing with my problems, and it's making everything worse."

Third, you give yourself agency. When you call something a choice, it becomes something you can choose differently. When you call something avoidance, you can stop avoiding. When you name your patterns, you can change them.

Clarity creates choice. Choice creates change. Change creates growth.

This applies to everything. Your relationships. Your work. Your mental health. Your substance use. Your coping mechanisms. All of it.

You might be depressed, or you might be avoiding dealing with your life. Maybe both. We need to name it accurately and see.

You might be anxious, or you might be catastrophizing. Figure it out and call it what it is.

You might be tired, or you might be avoiding something hard. Look at it honestly.

The Naming Method isn't comfortable. People don't like it at first. It feels confrontational. It feels harsh. They want more gentleness, more understanding, more space to keep telling themselves their stories.

But here's what I've seen over and over: the people who are willing to call things what they are? They're the ones who actually change. The ones who keep softening everything, justifying everything, telling themselves comfortable lies? They stay stuck.

You already know the truth about yourself. You're just scared to say it out loud. But naming it doesn't make it more real. It's already real. Naming it just lets you finally do something about it.

So if you work with me or anyone on our team, expect this. We're going to ask you to be honest about what's actually happening. We're going to help you name things accurately. We're not going to let you hide behind comfortable stories.

Not because we're trying to be hard on you, but because we actually want you to get better. And you can't get better if you won't call it what it is.