Are you testing yourself?

How many people fall into a trap of negative self-talk at least once a week? I bet this number would sky rocket that any price of a stock on the market that is ready to launch into space. Yes, I’m talking about you. Negativity, unfortunately, is part of our lives and to learn to control yourself is a process, BUT it is possible. Never say never, right?

Family members don’t help when you are having a bad day already and they add to your plate. Sounds familiar? Oh, I’m sure. We learn to talk negatively to ourselves when we don’t meet our expectations or someone else’s whether it’s at home or work.

Everyone’s life is different but we all somehow end up doing the same thing — talk down to ourselves. What’s worse is we get into the habit of saying negative words as if they truly reflected reality. Most of what you say to yourself is not true. Primarily because you focus on aspects of your life that didn’t come to fruition but why?

I will never be tired of pointing out that if you made a decision and it led to circumstances that are making your life harder, it doesn’t make you dumb. Nor does it make you stupid. No matter how smart you are, you can’t predict the best solutions. Unless you have secret powers that connect you to the Intelligent Infinity, that’s not on my table.

If we don’t talk negatively to ourselves, who does?

There’s a catch here! I don’t mean some alien entities (there’s a chance, though) who hover you and with some crazy telepathic abilities put words in your head. If something like that happened to you, contact me and we will elaborate on this!

I got a bit sidetracked with aliens… To truly understand who’s talking to you, remember that you have conscious and subconscious selves with the latter speaking through your feelings, emotions, fears. In the moments you experience anxiety or anger, these feelings are produced by that self who cannot forget the past.

We don’t always pay attention to what’s happening to us but the reactions are the same. These are triggered in response as our childhood memories. Even though you may not remember what you went through as a kid, your brain remembers and stores it deep inside where you can’t always “access the files”. I have heard that people get to the bottom of the cause through hypnosis. I have never tried it myself but I am curious how it works.

Why does our subconsciousness not leave dealing with negative self-talk to the consciousness so we don’t tell ourselves things that only make it worse?

Subconsciousness rules until you become aware.

I like to put it as your consciousness is your objective with your subconsciousness being subjective. The reason I say this is when you assess a situation objectively, you don’t speak through emotions.

For example, when you say 2+2=4, it’s your objective speaks. You know it’s true and you don’t overthink. As soon as you say, “2+2=4 but what if it’s 3 or maybe 5, or 10?! Who even said it was 4?!” without giving it any evidence whatsoever that would back the second statement. You assume until you learn whether it’s true or not.

That’s what our subconscious does. It tells you you are bad at multiplying in your head, when in reality you haven’t practiced that to even say, “I spent 100 hours practicing multiplication in my head but I see no progress at all.”Then you add that you can’t draw, play the guitar, don’t have a business, you don’t love your job, nobody loves you, your bank account has $2 in it but you still want to go to Disney Land etc.

Negative self-talk can be controlled by your consciousness.

The sooner your realize that your emotions/feelings are speaking to you and the voice you hear in your head is not necessarily a demon that is trying to possess you, but what simply is a lack of confidence, lack of self-love, lack of self-appreciation. These speak to you to point out what you need to work on, not what you think you need to work on. That’s exactly what I just said: confidence and self-love. Negative talks are empowered with every ounce of self-love you lose.

To practice self- love is to practice appreciation for being the way you are, accepting your flaws as much as your strengths and forgiving yourself for not being who you want to be right now. These are the key steps and they apply to everything when it comes to personal development and your health. In school I could never write a paragraph and would get F’s all the time. Look at me now. With practice, I learned to write more than one paragraph and I’m proud of myself. I am grateful that I chose to not listen to my fears and feel guilty for something I didn’t put enough effort into.

It won’t be easy in the beginning but if you start with small things, they will eventually turn into a massive amount of what you thought was never possible. Negative self-talk will be there to only stress that maybe your attention needs redirection for some time. Just like me. I thought I would never do it and i kept on blaming myself for everything instead of looking for a solution, because blaming yourself is easier. You don’t need to do anything for it, really. The result is immediate and you practically achieve what you have in your head, “self-hatred and self-denial” that also apply to other people. You reflect that on them and sometimes you don’t even notice.

What needs to be done to minimize negative self-talk.

• Notice what you say/think to yourself.
• Do you have anything to prove that negative thought? (P.S. a mistake doesn’t prove your whole being is a failure)
• Did you try to fix it or did you settle on having a negative talk with yourself?
• Get a pen and a piece of paper. Write down your ideas on what you can do to improve the situation.
• Write down what you have tried so far to compare it with your new ideas and ponder on what made you feel that way about yourself.
• Make sure you sleep enough. When I get only 4-6 hours, I can’t function. I don’t want to do anything and my head start spinning in the wrong direction.
• I spend most of my time at home but when I do take walks, I feel better. Give yourself a break and walk away from the environment where you think bad about yourself.
• If you have time to talk to yourself negatively, that means you have plenty of free time. Redirect your thought towards the things you’ve always wanted to do/have but never got to it. When you get rid of your distractions, that’s the time to work on yourself, not talk down to yourself instead.

Let me know in the comments below if you have already started working on thinking positively and what you would add to this list as another way to focus on the best moments.

Hope it helps. Stay tuned for more!