Someone very important in your life. Someone you listen to. Someone you care about. This someone says “Hey, stupid. Why did you do that? What was your little pea-brain doing when you made that terrible decision…again?”
Is that special someone you talking to yourself?
How would you feel if that someone was a good friend, or what you thought was a good friend? So why talk to yourself that way? After all, when you talk to yourself, you’re always listening.
We talk to ourselves thousands of times each day. And we’re always listening. Not only listening, but believing too.
How do we prepare for an important presentation? We practice, saying our prepared thoughts over and over again. Mental repetition is nearly as effective as public repetition. Our self-talk is being heard and being believed, over and over again.
Today, be aware of what you say when you talk to yourself. It really is important.
If you’re one who routinely chastises yourself do this instead. The next time you make a mistake, rather than beating yourself up about it, say “That’s not like me. The next time I’ll (add how you’ll avoid making that mistake again).”
Be good to you, be your own best friend. After all, if you don’t like you, how can you expect others to like you?
Sources and Resources:
- “Positive Messaging Leads to Growth,” more on self-talk by Jerry Lopper
- What to Say When You Talk to Yourself, Shad Helmstetter. This is an early book on the topic of self-talk and an excellent place to begin.
Here’s a good turn-about. Guess what my negative self-talk was today…”No one will comment.”
Oh well…
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