How to stop negative self talk
You are what you eat, they say, you are what you read, you are what you watch, you are what your physical, chemical, biological, astrological, and psychological structure is, and, importantly you are what you say you are.
It's hard to believe, but if we going around saying I'm a loser on a consistent basis, even jokingly, guess what-we've talked ourselves into Loserville, Pop. (Let's be politically correct and say 0, it's all in our heads. But I do have this one friend from high school who I think would objectively qualify. If he became the mayor of Loserville, for example, the town would generate new, rapid-fire, worldwide epidemic within two weeks. And my friend wouldn't even know about it, he'd be in his boxers in the janitor's closet in City Hall watching the reruns of a tennis game between two Yugoslavians he's never heard of that occurred in 1934, and eating some "chips" or something the rats left for health reasons).
That was a long, pointless aside, but I wanted to bring some humor into this article, and I failed, and anyway I'm going to make it longer so that we can really get into the meat of the issue. Here it goes. Some ideas for stopping negative self talk.
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1. OK. We're talking about how to stop negative self talk. Now, you have certain very practical, overachieving, I've never felt unoptimistic in my life people who would look at us and say: Are you kidding? Just stop. And we'd want to say, Your plastic surgery reminds me of an old Star Trek episode, back when they used Play-Dough for special effects. Yeah, I think the character's name was Gorgsplat. But we wouldn't. The thing is, we don't want to dismiss Gorgsplat's advice entirely. Part of stopping negative step talk will come down to sheer self-discipline, because negative self talk is a habit just like any other. At some point a smoker just has to grit his teeth and bear it, for example. But you don't go up to a smoker and say just stop already. Go away, Gorgsplat.
2. Let's start simple. Let's sit down and make a list of the ways in which we use negative self talk. Let's say, for example, that we're concerned about our weight. And every time a weight loss commercial comes on TV, every time we hear a fat joke on a sitcom, every time the subject comes up in a classroom setting, business meeting, heck, even in casual conversation with trusted friends, we immediately begin talking about how unattractive we are and so forth. You see, right there we've taken a big step. We know what are "triggers" are, that is we know the sort of situation that is likely to lead to negative self talk about weight.
3. The biggest mistake a person can make once they've made an important realization about themselves, is let it go, let it slide, lose the notebook they were writing in, and so forth. The key to change is act on the change the moment your brain and heart flood you with good feelings. So write that down. We talk negatively about ourselves when weight loss commercials come on. We talk negatively about ourselves if our kid is watching Homer Simpson. The fact that we know this means that we can do something about it.
4. Alright, we've pinpointed all the areas that we're aware of when it comes to negative self talk, and we're working on getting them under control. But is it possible that we've missed some? Is it possible that our friends, acquaintances, and family members could point out a few we may have missed? It just might. Try it, and see.
5. Now, the last thing we'll discuss is this. When it comes to negative self talk, one of the fiercest ways of fighting it is to be aware of it, try to discipline ourselves into not participating it, and also doing something about the insecurity, e.g., in the case of being embarrassed about our weight, we start going to the gym. These fives steps will give us a good beginning to stopping negative self talk.
