We are all aware of how our words can affect others either positively or negatively and this has a great bearing on the quality of our relationships. If we are scathing and belittling of others then we eventually spoil our relationships or at the very least create a conflict in them. If we are loving and caring with others we build good strong relationships based on mutual trust and understanding.
We often take care to talk someone up when they are down and to listen to them and encourage them, and we hope that they would do the same for us. However how often do we belittle ourselves and talk ourselves down when the very thing we need is encouragement? Our self talk is something that we carry with us throughout our lives. Think about how you talk to yourself when you are feeling discouraged or depressed. Is it positive and upbeat or is it harsh and destructive? We often care less for ourselves than we do for others and although we would be kind and supportive to a friend in need, when our own need arises we can be overly critical and condemning of ourselves in our inner minds.
Our self talk is massively important in our lives and if we are using it to destroy our confidence and belittle ourselves, our self image suffers and we lose our confidence. We talk of our failures and short comings with others which goes to further re-enforce this self created reality. Our actions follow our beliefs about ourselves and soon we prove ourselves right by acting in a way that is congruent with our beliefs. The end result is the conditions of our lives.
On the other hand if we can talk ourselves up and tell ourselves all the things which we need to hear instead, being compassionate and loving to ourselves, we will achieve a very different outcome . Imagine the difference in your life had you learned only to create positive self talk from the moment you learned to talk. Â How often do you find yourself belittling yourself or undermining your confidence with your thoughts?
If we choose to only think in terms of positive self confidence and self assuring thoughts which build us up and improve our self confidence and self image, soon we begin to change our language in line with our new self image. We talk to others differently and instead of talking in terms of self depreciation and limitation we begin to talk ourselves up instead. Our actions are empowered by our thinking process and the knock on effect brings better results in our lives.
Our limitations come from our self image and not from external factors such as location, upbringing and opportunity. Of course these things help us to achieve our self image but ultimately we can change. How we see ourselves is massively important particularly when striving to attain something which appears out of our reach. Success comes from a success consciousness much like failure comes from a failure consciousness. In Stuart and Jay’s course in SFM something really jumped out at me. It was something in the material which said that the conditions of your life can’t change beyond your self image. Â This was massive for me and I realised that this is what had been holding me back in my life more than anything.
Your self image is something which you can’t run away from. It follows you wherever you go! If you are just reading this and haven’t thought about this before you might think that changing the way you talk to yourself is not possible – you have always been like that and that’s just you! But you are in control of how you choose to think and you can ultimately decide which thoughts to give your energy to.
One of the first steps in gaining greater control over your negative self talk is simply by noticing your inner chatter. What do you tell yourself when you are feeling upset? Is it positive and compassionate? How about when you feel happy and joyful? Once you notice your self talk and become more aware of it you are in a position to change it. Whenever you notice you are telling yourself something negative, stop, and think of something that makes you feel positive. Be compassionate with it at first as it will have become a habit which has developed over many years.
Meditation is a great for exercising power over your inner thoughts too and simply sitting quietly and watching our thoughts for 5-10 minutes each day will give us an awareness of what is going on with our self talk.