Are you one of those busy people that work hard and has little or no time to slow down and reflect upon your own needs? Something along the lines of what you truly want and whether you live the life you deserve? If you fall into this group, it is very likely that you may suffer from excessive mental stress, as well as invisible “enemy” known as “negative self talk”. This condition in the last thirty years has become the primary cause for a wide array of mental health deviations people experience nowadays. in fact, it has become so potent that it is now reaching epidemic levels.
What is causing this inadequacy and what can be done to treat this dysfunction?
As this is quite extensive subject, in this text, we will aim to provide short summary of causes and what you can do to alleviate this problem for good. When we say this, we mean working on yourself daily to be able to neuter early shots of this rather complicated mental deviation.
Where should you start? Ideally, you should always start by effectively observing your predominant thoughts and emotions. You will do that by learning and practising complete mind and body relaxation, which we teach in our mind/body energy rejuvenation programme: “The Hour of Power”. Your thoughts, emotions and emotional states are completely interlinked and are difficult to separate. But when you learn to completely relax your mind and body, you will over time notice subtle or “hidden” influence that these three important mental faculties exert over you on a daily basis. You will achieve this by willingly reducing your brainwave activity, which will immediately allow you to focus on the moment and realise as to whether your thoughts, emotions and emotional states correctly reflect your present physical reality. If not – you will then be able to go deeper and become aware of your “negative” chatter box that literally sits behind and keeps telling you all sorts of irrelevant and negative constructs.
This is where the root cause of your problem lies and what you must become mindful at all times – if possible. People experience significant negative self talk, which in most cases is totally irrelevant to what they are witnessing in their physical reality. As this is the case, it is causing mental and emotional disparity that leads to instability, due to contrasting interpretations of what is seen externally and then experienced internally through aforementioned three faculties. In other words, you clearly see with your own eyes one thing, but your brain processes it in totally different way, making it more complex and unsavory experience for you than what it is in reality.
The main reason as to why this happens is because of your preprogrammed negative self talk that always finds the way to paint any situation darker than it is. The good news is this is mental programme and just like any programme can be changed, modified and even deleted. Although the latter is more complex, but is still possible.
What do you need to do?
The first step is to master the ability to relax your mind and body at will. When you reach this level of proficiency, you can then focus down on your predominant thoughts. However, it is not recommended at any point to get involved into any of your mental activities, because in doing so, you will further reinforce their influence over you. Instead, you must first and foremost become aware of what is going on deep from within your psyche for the purpose of better preparation of corrective actions. You will do this by being perfectly still and acting solely as an observer and nothing else. In our programme, we will teach you how to do precisely this.
When you become aware as “third person” and this means you have not accepted any suggestions coming from your mental faculties, you can then start to focus on what you truly want, such as imagining yourself being worry free, happy and fulfilled? Naturally this is not going to be “walk in the park”, particularly if you live hectic life and you find it hard to spare quality time to relax fully. In such cases, you will struggle mightily and before you embark upon this venture, you must ensure you are able to create required environment for you to succeed. Because if not, you are in danger of falling pray of low self perception and inadequacy? In so far, I have identified these two causes as most destructive forces that sit behind majority of known mental dysfunctions. In that respect, imagine your life without the weight of your inner critic? What would your daily life feel like without all conquering negative self-talk? What possibilities would emerge in its absence?
The effects of disempowering inner dialogue might feel all too familiar, but rarely do we ever consider its toll on quality of our lives. If we don’t put a conclusive stop on an inner war we wage with ourselves, we will eventually fall prey to things like imposter syndrome, the comparison trap and self-doubt. Not only do these make us feel bad, but they also keep us from venturing out, trying new things, creating new skills and eventually experiencing the life worth living.
I’m sure you never agreed to become a mere spectator, as oppose to being a key player in your life. And I’m certain that you wouldn’t choose self-doubt given the option. So, what’s going on and why is all this happening?
Negative self-talk usually arises from a strained relationship with oneself, habitually nurtured by inadequate parental and social conditioning, which one could interpret as “inner opposition”. It’s disabling resistance that sits deep within ourselves – resistance to our worth, our competency, our “enough-ness.” The result is self-doubt and an ensuing belief that we’re lacking in some way (neither of which is true, hence it doesn’t feel good). So what is the solution? The best way to start the process of change is to become aware of your thoughts. Thereafter, you must become aware of your customary emotions, which always follow your thoughts and lastly – you must become aware of your predominant beliefs, which are directly influenced by your thoughts and emotions. Your beliefs dictate what is possible and what isn’t without us in most cases ever questioning their validity. And this is the hole into which most of us succumb and from which we struggle to find the easy way out. The main reason for this rather peculiar behaviour is in our mental programming that relentlessly looks for evidence to support its present beliefs. This is precisely what negative self talk subliminally does by constantly reinforcing same or similar thoughts/emotions that keep us grounded and powerless to move forward in our desired new directions.
“Evidence is conclusive that your self-talk has a direct bearing on your performance.” – Zig Ziglar
As humans, we’re hardwired for connection and belonging. Our brain’s job is to keep us safe, and it treats social threats the same as environmental threats. So, for example, if the boss throws us under the bus in a meeting, it triggers us in the same way as a tiger lunging at us from a bush. Rejection literally hurts the brain. Any experience of isolation, exclusion, disapproval, humiliation or perceived negative judgment registers as physical pain in the brain.
If rejection is painful and social threats are on par with environmental threats, then that means we’re doing everything we can to stay in favourable standing with others. The need for acceptance and approval drives much of what we think, say, do, and feel. For example, think back to the last high-stakes presentation you gave and any accompanying anxiety you may have experienced. Now, consider the contents of your inner dialogue, which may have sounded like this: “What if I fail? What if I sound like I don’t know what I’m talking about?”
This kind of pervasive anxiety is so common that we rarely get to the root of the fear. We say it’s fear of failure or fear of doing a bad job, but I encourage you to inquire further. What’s really underneath this fear? It’s a fear of negative judgment, which maps to rejection, which maps to pain our brain tries to avoid at all costs.
We generally don’t like pain and most of us tend to steer clear from social and environment threats. The need to stay safe is so primal that our brain’s search for safety influences our perception to navigate in a way that favours our safety. What we see, what we interpret and what we believe is largely influenced by this need to stay safe.
Negative self-talk
So back to negative self-talk. Where does it come from? Frankly, at some point in your past you took on a negative self-image to protect yourself from rejection. That negative self-belief, such as “I’m not good enough” is like a lens you look through. Through that lens you’re more easily able to identify the situations where you may be “found out.” As a result, you’re more apt to look for situations where it’s easy for your worth to shine. This kind of conditional living leads you to play it safe and keeps you from putting yourself out there. Keeping the lens focused on safe alternatives is exactly what keeps us from thriving. More importantly, it’s the filter through which all negative self-talk emerges – the running commentary that’s guiding you toward safety.
Breaking out from the victimisation of negative belief that guards you from rejection requires getting to the source of your negative self-talk. Give yourself the opportunity to no longer “choose” it. Try these tips to free yourself from the weight of your inner critic:
- Answer the question: “What are you afraid people would think, decide or find out about you?” Whatever you answer is what you believe about yourself and that’s the root of your negative self-talk.
- Acknowledge that you took on this belief to make sense of perceived rejection. This belief originally was a defensive filter, but has become a completely unhelpful and inaccurate way to protect yourself from the primal fear of rejection. Recognising that you unknowingly chose it to stay safe helps loosen the grip of inner opposition.
- Ask: Does it serve me and the world to hold onto this belief? Meeting this choice with logic often is enough to see the futility in it. It makes it much harder to actively choose a negative self-belief when you see that no one benefits.
- Choose otherwise. No one is perfect and mistakes are inevitable. In fact, according to recent research, we want to fail 15 percent of the time for optimal learning and growth. Find solace in our humanity and claim the truth that you’re inherently “enough” and on your own unique path. Decide to know that you’re whole and complete and that mistakes are part of your own learning curve necessary for your growth.
- Practise “not engaging” in your negative self-talk. This represents the form of mental control in where you purposefully direct your mental focus on anything, but engaging in your inner talk. In doing this, you may choose to observe something in your vicinity and/or listen intently for all sounds that might come from the same, whilst totally ignoring everything that’s swirling in your head. In this way, you will stop feeding the flow of your mental energy into your negative self-talk (you will stop feeding it) and over time, it will weaken and become irrelevant.
The moment you make peace with the truth of your enough-ness is the moment you stop negative self-talk at its root.
If you wish to learn more on how to heal yourself from devastating effects of negative self talk, please visit our website: www.energy-savvy.com and in particular we would recommend you try our 20 weeks energy and mental healing programme “The Hour of Power”, in which we will teach you various energy generation exercises, mind reframing techniques and routines. Alternatively, you may contact us via email on: info@energy-savvy.com and we’ll be more that happy to assist you in any way we can.
