Preventive vs. Preventative PART TWO
Some time ago I wrote a piece on how there was no such word as preventative. I explained I learned this while contracting with a company where we teach health benefits. I “proved” it by looking in one dictionary where phonetically it was pronounced preventive not preventative.
Since my brother was one of the people whom I subsequently taught this lesson, he took it to heart.
One day he explained this to someone he knew. This guy proved my brother wrong.
I looked at the evidence my brother presented (I should mention, my brother is a lawyer) and emailed the trainer who taught me, to show her the word preventative does exist.
Her response: Yep…the word has always existed. It’s just that “preventive” is the preferred word.
But this can’t be! I have a published story which says preventive doesn’t exist. I will have to delete this story from my 2nd edition.
But my brother reminded me, this is what my book is about: shifting difficult situations to opportunities.
What’s difficult about this is its very embarrassing to have something wrong in written proof. The opportunity is I don’t have to hide this or be embarrassed. I could admit I was mistaken.
I obviously heard what I wanted to hear when I learned this the first time and jumped to a conclusion, which I put in writing!
When I admit my mistakes:
• I have the opportunity to see how I can learn from wrong conclusions
• I change my focus to see it differently
• My embarrassment is released
Also in the email by my trainer was:
Even though preventive is preferred and that’s what we want to teach people to use, the language might be changing and one day preventative will be the preferred usage. My English teacher friends are always reminding me language shifts…and that’s why we don’t say shan’t anymore!
So not only can we shift difficult situations to opportunities, but the vocabulary we use will shift as well!