Have you ever caught yourself saying the same words over and over again without even realizing it? These words are used so often that they’ve become filler words. Overused words can make our writing and speech sound unoriginal. 

Engle Diaz Diaz said, “In my opinion, I think ‘LOL,’ ‘Sigma,’ and ‘6-7’ are overused because people always say them, and I have a feeling they don’t know what they mean.”

Some words or phrases have become so popular that people start using them without even knowing the meaning. For example, LOL means “laugh out loud,” but half the time, the speaker is not even laughing. The word Sigma started as a way to describe a confident or independent person, but it’s often thrown around online without much thought. Even numbers like 6-7 can spread on social media just because they sound trendy.

At this point, 6-7 might as well be a celebrity. When we use these kinds of words so much, they start to lose their real meaning and become banal. Hasenet Abdullcadirn feels as though “like” is used too often, as she says, “ I feel as though it’s unnecessary. It’s fine to use filler words, but I hear ‘like’ five times in a sentence. That’s overusing it.” Relatable. Sometimes you can’t even finish a sentence without someone dropping five “likes” in there.

Joel Campos Ventura says, “A phrase that I think is overused is ‘you’re cooked’ because a lot of the time it’s just a minor inconvenience that doesn’t have you ‘cooked.’ 

Julio Romerec said, “ I think 6-7 is way too overused because of how popular it is.” A lot of people shared the same opinion as Julio, and to be honest, 6-7 is way more overused compared to some of the other words in this article. Like bro, chill.  Jerome Odie said, “Rizz is so frequently used that most people who say they have it, really don’t.” Can’t argue with that, if you have to say you have rizz…you probably don’t.

In this segment, we asked students to quote overused phrases in their language. Cindy Martinez said, “ A phrase in Spanish that is used frequently is ‘Ponte las Pilas,’ which means to lock in.”

Joel Campos Ventura says, “ A phrase in Spanish that a lot of people say is ‘Que no ves?’ which is said when you are asked to look for something, but you can’t seem to find it.”

Finally, we have Sharon Itobi, who said, “A phrase from my native language is ‘Abeg shift. ‘It’s overused because it’s funny.” This phrase is translated to “please, move.”

Although people overuse words to the point that it gets annoying, there are also people who would like to normalize certain words or phrases.

Engle Diaz Diaz said, “I think an underrated word that should be normalized is the word ‘fascinate’ because you can use it for many types of sentences instead of using the words ‘interest’ or ‘interesting’ repeatedly.”

Using different words can make our writing and communication sound better. Fascinated is a stronger word than interested and shows more insight.

Cindy Martinez said, “ I would normalize the word ‘word’ because I feel like it’s so charming.” In context, “word” basically means “I agree” or “for real,” so yeah, word.

Maybe next time, when you’re about to say “LOL” for the tenth time today…maybe try something new. Or don’t. But if you keep saying “sigma and 6-7,” don’t be surprised if someone roasts you for it. 

What words and phrases do YOU overuse? Which ones are you tired of hearing?