What you say to yourself affects your attitudes, moods and actions, and even your health. In fact, your brain processes more rapidly what you say to yourself than if you spoke it out loud. In contrast to speaking out loud, inner speech leads immediately to an inner image of what you’ve said to yourself and your response to it. You say to yourself, “I don’t like broccoli”, for example. You see yourself cringing at the thought of it. The thought (I hate broccoli) and its image and motor movement (You cringing to show your dislike) is what gets your brain and body to take this idea seriously enough to influence your feelings, thinking, behavior, and health.
As self-talk develops in the same area of the brain that executes behavior, the mind will fulfill what you say to yourself through action, even if you are unaware of it. Hence, self-talk gets examined for its meanings (pattern recognition), associated actions (motor movement), and relationship to who you are, and what you intend to fulfill (higher-level planning and interpretation). You’ve heard me talk about the brain’s frontal lobe region in more than one article, thus far. This executive area of your brain is central to giving form to what you think, positive or negative, in attitude, feeling, and action. Hence, what you tell yourself has the power to shape the features of your life. Yes, you may wish for your true love or the job of your dreams to come to you. But, if your self-talk does not support these desires, you will not think, feel, and behave in ways to bring this about.
Just thinking positively does not make all of your dreams come true. Self-talk doesn’t work like this. Unfortunately, some advocates of the alternative mind and body health movement have put forth a rather superficial approach to fulfilling your dreams by what you say to yourself. According to them, there’s a secret you have to be let in on in order to reap the wealth of the universe. Think positively, they say; the universe wants you to have everything you want in life. Actually, this is not enough.
Indeed, the universe or God may want you to have everything that you want from life. But, it takes more than a wish to make this happen. There’s nothing wrong with dreaming. We need dreams to inspire us. But, your dreams must be backed up with your whole being, to get closer to bringing them about. Thus, today, I’m going to share with you two features of positive self-talk that will get you closer to realizing the life that you want for yourself.
Walk the Walk of Your Self-Talk
First, you have to walk the walk of your self-talk. The power of self-talk comes from an alignment of your whole being with what you want. Remember, self-talk develops in the executive, frontal lobe region of the brain. Your brain needs you to align your whole being with your desires. You just can’t wish for something to happen, to make it appear. No matter how much you tell yourself that something will come about, you have to behave in ways to make this happen.
Align your self-talk with an attitude, feeling, and behavior that permits its realization. For example, recently, John’s friend Pete told him that John couldn’t find true love, because he didn’t want it enough for himself. If John really wanted to find his soul mate, he has to wish for it with all of his heart. Wishing for it deeply enough would make it come true.
John asked me what I thought of Pete’s suggestion. True to my therapist nature, I turned the question back on him, so that I could begin to guide his inner process.
Dr. D: What do you think about Pete’s suggestion, John?
J: I don’t know; I really want to find the love of my life to marry. I wish for it everyday. But, what I find are women who don’t want to settle down.
Dr. D: So you wish strongly for this, but find you are attracting the opposite of your wish?
J: Yes, right. I see her in my mind’s eye. I imagine who I want to bring into my life, strongly, like Pete told me to do. But, it isn’t working. Maybe I’m not doing it right?
Dr. D: Do you deserve to find her John?
J: Well, yes. I think so.
Dr. D.: Sounds like you have some doubt?
J: Maybe. I’ve never had luck when it comes to dating. Some people are just lucky you know. My parents were unlucky in love.
Dr. D.: Unlucky in love. That’s a powerful statement. Did you hear them say this?
J: Oh my God, yes. My mother said repeatedly, “I was unlucky in love.” She and my father are really mismatched. Imagine growing up hearing this all of the time.
Dr. D.: I am imagining it. It’s a powerful message. Tell me more about it.
J: I felt sorry for my mom, and my dad too. I see her so clearly in my mind. It’s so sad. She was so hard on herself. She criticized herself over everything. The real difference between mom and my dad was that mom blamed herself for the problems between them.
Dr. D: Like you blame yourself, when things in your love relationship go wrong.
J: Exactly. Maybe I’m not good looking enough or smart enough to make them stay. I wish it could have been different for my mom.
Dr. D: If only you could wish it away for her, right? Just like you want to wish into your life your true love. If only wishing was enough, right?
J: Okay, how did we get here (laughing out loud – LOL). No, wishing isn’t enough.
Dr. D: No, it is not enough to just wish or believe strongly for something to happen. There’s so much more to bringing about the things that you most desire.
Telling yourself what you want, and assuming you will get it, is not enough, if there’s no action to back it up. Just behind John’s wish to find the love of his life were negative self-statements about his destiny to fail in love, like his mother. He keeps choosing women who will leave him, as failing in love is stronger for him than succeeding in it.
John needs to walk the walk of his self-talk, to find the love of his life. He tells himself that he wants to find his true love. He imagines them together in his mind’s eye, but to no use, in terms of specific choices and actions. This gets us to the second feature of positive self-talk that I want to share with you today.
Self-Compassionate Self-Talk Beats Unrealistic Wishing, Every Time
Be Careful How You Talk To Yourself, Because You Are Listening!
John didn’t realize how much time he spent telling himself that he was unlucky in love, like his mother. No matter what he was doing, the random access memory (RAM) of his mind held negative ideas and images that spoke mostly to his failing in love. You have to understand what being successful in love really means to John, to understand why he sets himself up to fail, by choosing the wrong women. John heard his mother’s statement (I’m unlucky in love) as a plea to never leave her. He heard, “It’s just you and me son.” He felt solidarity with his mother in her unhappiness. If John found his true match in life, he would leave his mother alone in her unhappiness, at least unconsciously. Not abandoning her was a far-more powerful cause of his behavior than his desire to find true love.
John needed to counter his inner program to fail in love, by compassionate self-talk. Compassion is the real secret to positive self-talk! Let’s see what I mean, here. Health psychology researcher Juliana Breines, from the University of California, at Berkeley, tested the effects of self-compassion on well-being over four different studies. She found that when people talk to themselves about negative events compassionately, they show a greater willingness to learn from, and improve on, their self-perceived weakness, mistakes, or failures. Hence, in our example, John needs to talk to himself about how he will overcome the tendency to choose the wrong women to love. John must focus his self-talk on the seeds of personal change, rather than on a baseless affirmation of what he wants to happen. “I will find my true love”, for example, becomes, “I choose to be lucky in love.” “I will make my love relationship better than the one of my parents.” “My mother wants me to find true love.” “I will take the steps needed to find an emotionally available woman.” Wow, now, this self-talk is powerful enough to make John’s dreams come true, because, although it is still positive, it is aimed directly at the negative self-programming that’s stopping him from being happy. As researcher Breines found, John will, now, be able to minimize the effects of choosing mates who are poorly matched to him, by learning how to do better.
Compassionate self-talk speaks to deep psychological understanding of why you have been unable to realize certain dreams. It’s compassionate toward whatever it is that is stopping you.
John will become the change that he wants to happen through compassionate self-talk that focuses on the steps he must take to get there.Let’s try your hand at it right now. Use the steps that follow to develop a compassionate self-talk script that will help you to get closer to your dreams.
Steps to Compassionate Self-Talk
- Bring into your awareness the powerful negative ideas and images of yourself that stop you from fulfilling your desires. There are many ways to bring your negative programs to your awareness. A good therapist can help you to do this. But, you can do this on your own as well, if you dedicate yourself enough to the process. Becoming mindful of how you think, what runs through your mind daily, will really show you the workings of your mind and the negative self-talk that may be leading you into unfulfilling, self-defeating situations. The link to this YouTube mindfulness video will show you how to do this. I am a strong advocate of mindfulness training and have done this myself for many years. Also, you may jot down the negative things you say about yourself, when things don’t go right for you. This self-talk usually contains the programming that is stopping you from fulfilling your dreams.
- Develop compassionate self-talk that counters negative programming. Compassionate self-talk is so much more than positive attributes that you have or wish to have. Compassionate self-talk must be linked directly to the negative ideas and images that you uncovered in Step 1. Remember, the case of John. I tied John’s compassionate self talk directly to his negative belief that he was unlucky in love. Take a few minutes to jot down some compassionate self-talk that counters your negative programming.
- Backup compassionate self-talk statements and images that you developed in Step 2 with thoughts, feelings, and actions that help you to walk the walk of your self talk. For example, now that John really wanted to find true love, he needed to date women who are emotionally available. First, he identified the type of woman who instinctively attracts him, but who is also emotionally unavailable. This he called his “fail in love” type. Then, he made a conscious choice to date women who did not fit this role. He would date now his “lucky in love” type of woman. John was uncomfortable, at first. But, over time, his compassionate self-talk, and behavior to back it up, won out. Today, John has true love.
What you say to you, about yourself, does matter. Make no mistake about this. You are what you think, as well as what you eat. Try your hand at this powerful compassionate self-talk exercise. I assure you that when you talk to yourself about the seeds of how you are going to change, your self-talk will begin to work for you.
I hope you can use what I have shared with you today to better your life. If you liked my post, please let me know by selecting the LIKE icon immediately below. And, if you’d like to let others know about today’s topic, just select the Google +1 link below as well.
I look forward to your thoughts and comments. Enjoy your compassionate self-talk! Warmly, Deborah.
