A Simple Practice for Catching Out Negative Self-Talk
Identifying with your failures can bring about a world of hurt. Making mistakes is natural (and useful), and has no bearing on our self-worth. Of course, we all know this. Even so, whether we realize it or not, the stories we tell ourselves about our failures can promote the wrong attitude, and create an identity that works against us.
Negative self-talk
The main way in which we reinforce a harmful self-image is through negative self-talk. I do this all the time. Sometimes it’s very obvious and exaggerated. “That was pathetic. I really shouldn’t be struggling so much with this.” Very often it’s related to something entirely insignificant. “I’m such an idiot, I can’t believe I forgot to add the salt.” Other times it’s very subtle. “Ah shit, I did it again.”
You might think that this is just a means of expression. You don’t actually think you’re an idiot, that’s just the word you use when you express your frustration. But even though you might believe this on the surface, your subconscious attitude towards yourself is often shaped irrespective of your intentions.
Negative self-talk will reinforce whatever identity is coherent with the story that you’re telling yourself. If you call yourself an idiot enough times, you will normalize that idea for your subconsciousness to the point where you identify with it.
I’m sure the description I just gave is less than ideal from a psychological point of view. My terminology might be off, but what’s important is to recognize that there is a process in place for updating our identity through the way we address our self.
Working through negative self-talk
The good news is that we can change this. If we become aware of the way in which self-talk shapes our identity, we can take steps towards eliminating it. If I notice one of these patterns coming up, I will often stop and reason through it. “I understand that I’m frustrated, but I’m not actually an idiot. That’s just a label I’ve given myself, and it’s not useful. I’ve made a mistake and that’s fine – it means I’m human! Let’s just move on.”
If you think you’ve made a mistake (which is when I find most of my negative self-talk coming up) you can do a mental exercise like this, and then continue by calmly fixing the mistake or simply moving on with your day. Either way, what matters is that you can work on getting rid of your negative self-image by reinforcing a better identity. You are just human, and your self-worth is a fact, irrespective of what you do or how well you do it.
Redirecting self-talk
The issue is that negative self-talk often happens in the flurry of everyday life. When we are caught up in doing a dozen other things, it’s difficult to stop and carefully and deliberately alter the story we tell ourselves.
Luckily, we can steer away from self-defeating thoughts without having to go through the whole mental exercise. One way to do this is by making sure the negative self-talk leaves a bad impression. In my experience, a thought process that we identify as harmful or distasteful is less likely to come up again.
Another issue is that negative self-talk can be subtle or disguised, making it difficult to notice in the moment, especially if you’re very used to certain patterns of thinking.
So, what we need is a way to quickly identify negative self-talk and allow it to make a bad impression. There is a very simple way to do this – turning the “I” into a “you”.
It’s very simple. Any time a self-defeating thought comes up, repeat it to yourself while rephrasing it so that it’s aimed at a friend, or someone you care about, instead of you. Basically, imagine you were saying it to someone else. You can often achieve this by literally changing the “I”s into “you”s; so “Great, I’ve screwed it up again” becomes “Great, you’ve screwed it up again”. Ouch. That’s pretty harsh! Can you imagine ever saying something like that to your friend?
If you cared about someone, you’d support them, even if they screwed up. You wouldn’t put them down just because they made a mistake. So why do you put yourself down?
The point of this is to give you a new perspective on your thoughts; to show you just how badly you’re treating yourself in those moments. And, ideally, this really should happen in the moment. When this idea first came to mind for me, I wrote it down on a sticky note on my desk. I glanced at it every once in a while, which ensured it was fresh in my mind for when the opportunity arose to apply it.
I urge you to try this redirecting practice – it’s surprisingly effective. It still shocks me every time, which is exactly what it’s meant to do. I can guarantee those negative thoughts will come up less often, just by virtue of how uncomfortable they make you feel.
This will help you escape some of the traps that make negative self-thinking so difficult to deal with. It’s not a “quick and easy solution to everything”. If that’s the kind of answer you’re looking for, I’ve got bad news – it doesn’t exist.
What this can help you with, instead, is taming your negative thought patterns and becoming more conscious of thoughts that are detrimental. If you combine this with journaling, or some other means of reflection, you’ll be on your path to dissolving your self-defeating identities. I’m on this path myself, and could not be happier about it.
Be aware of what identity you are reinforcing, and realize that you are not your failures. I hope that this practice can be as helpful to you in achieving this as it was for me.
I’d love to hear about your struggles with negative self-talk, your experience with overcoming it, or anything else, so please leave a comment or get in touch.
Thank you for investing your attention with me!
This article is part 1 of my 50 Bad Articles initiative, where I write 50 crappy articles in 50 days, in an attempt to kickstart my writing journey.
