What do You say to Yourself You would Never let Anyone else to Say to You? (Negative Self Talk)

I often encounter people in the course of my work who tell me “I am my own worst enemy” and I believe it. It is so easy for us to believe the worst about ourselves, to put ourselves down, to litter our days’ thoughts with negative self talk.  Somewhere in our past we’ve been delivered the message that to say positive, uplifting things about ourselves is to be stuck up, arrogant, self involved, and egotistical. Of course there is a balance when it comes to being self-centered.  I would like to take back that phrase and remove the negativity associated with it.  When we hear ‘self-centered’ we think of someone vain or arrogant, who thinks they are better than everyone else.  I would like to use the phrase to mean that someone is balanced in his or her life, knows their place in the world, what their passionate work should be and is able to stay in the here-and-now to live life to the fullest.

I think the actual dynamic that is taking place when we put ourselves down is threefold.  First, we can make a negative statement with the hope ‘it won’t get worse than this’, second, if we say it out loud, someone will disagree, say something positive about us to contradict the negative thing we said, and third, we can stay comfortable in self-doubt and keep ourselves from stepping out of our comfort zone.

Take some quiet time and, in your notebook, list some negative things you say about yourself that would hurt you deeply if someone else you love said to you.  Now go back and think on these things, think on why it would hurt if someone who loves you said these things to you.  Now remember, your first duty in life is to love and cherish yourself as the sacred, miracle you are.  Why would you allow yourself to hurt your psyche by saying these things to yourself?  Go back to your notebook, re-write those negative statements in to positive ones and re-read them every day remembering you wouldn't let anyone else say those things to you so you won't anymore either.