Book Excerpt: Working With Negative Self-Talk
Would you talk to someone you love the way that you talk to yourself?
Published: 11/20/2021
by Nick Oredson
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Introduction
It is very common to have a negative internal dialogue going on in our minds. Continual self-criticism and absolute statements such as "I’m such a klutz" or "I can’t do this" can be running in the background continually - often with little or no conscious awareness. It is also very common to have an internal narrative that is some variation of the story “I am not good enough”. This can take many different forms including: "I am not smart enough", "I am not fast enough", "I am not pretty enough", "I am not tall enough", "I am not handsome enough", "I am not athletic enough", "I am not skinny enough", etc. etc. This internal narrative is often connected to a sense of unworthiness, and is often one of the driving forces behind the phenomenon known as the imposter syndrome.
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Continual self-criticism and absolute
statements such as "I’m such a klutz"
or "I can’t do this" can be running in
the background continually - often
with little or no conscious awareness.
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The Inventory
A good first step changing these negative narratives is to create an inventory - taking a moment to write down the internal messages as they come up over the course of a week or so. Working on the inventory often provides relief as it is the first step in moving something that has been exclusively inside us, to something that safely down on a piece of paper – outside of us.
The Distinction Between Internalized and Externalized Narrative
Once the inventory is done (this usually takes a week or two) we can start the process of examining the transcript and looking for patterns and themes. One of the first patterns to look for is the distinction between internalized narrative messages and externalized narrative messages. If we notice that there are lots of “you statements” in the transcript such as "You are so clumsy" it means that the messages have been externalized. If we notice more “I statements” such as "I am so clumsy" it means that the messages have been internalized.
Working with an Internalized Narrative
Internalizing the messages is very common because many young people consider it the safer choice to make themselves the “bad” one (or clumsy, or wrong, or stupid, etc.). This choice is safer because the alternative is that the parents might be flawed, bad or incompetent and this puts the young person in the position of being both unsafe and out of control at the same time – an extremely undesirable reality for a young person to accept.
Questioning the Narrative
With this understanding in mind - and the narratives safely outside of us on a piece of paper - it is time to start questioning the messages one at a time. Usually, the process involves going through each of the negative statements in the transcript and after each one write down next to it the word “Really?”. This simple action starts the process of questioning the narrative that was inflicted on us, and replacing it with a narrative that we choose. After this, it is often very helpful to go through each of the statements and write down the exact opposite phrase next to it - i.e. if the phrase is "I’m such a klutz" write down "No, actually I am very graceful". It is now possible to go through the transcript as many times as needed to actively integrate these new messages and delete the old ones.
Working with an Externalized Narrative
The first step in working with externalized narratives is to go through the transcript one item at a time and ask the question “who is talking?” Sometimes there is a single parent or adult that is responsible for the entire narrative, sometimes there are other voices involved. In addition to the question “who is talking?” below is a list of other prompts to consider when going through the transcript:
-What is the essence of the message?
-When is the first time I remember hearing this message?
-Is this message useful to me as an adult?
-Are there certain situations that trigger this message?
-How often do I hear this message?
-Does this message provide me with something (such as “safety”)?
-How might someone who wants me to be safe, or who is concerned about my well-being think this would be a helpful thing to say?
Below is an example of how these prompts might be answered:
What is the message?
-You are lazy, you will never amount to anything.
Who is talking?:
-Dad
When is the first time I remember hearing this message?:
-Somewhere around 13 or14?
Is this message useful to me as an adult? Why?
-No. This is not a useful observation for me as an adult
Are there certain situations that trigger this message?
-When I feel tired in the morning, when I feel like I might be getting sick or if I feel like I need a day off from work.
How often do I hear this message?
-I hear this message several times per week.
Does this message provide me with something, if so, what?
-I am not aware that this message provides me anything.
How might someone who wants me to be safe, or who is concerned about my well-being think this would be a helpful thing to say?
-I can suppose that my father was worried that I was lazy and thought
this might be a way to motivate me to get up and get busy. He might have
also been projecting his own battle with laziness onto me.
The Process of Politely Declining
After answering the prompts, it is often helpful to formulate a sentence that politely declines the message, and then thanks the person delivering the message for their care and concern. In the above example, politely declining might look something like this:
“Thank you for your care and concern - I truly appreciate that you care about
me and are looking out for my best interest. However, this message is not
useful to me at this point in my life, it does nothing to help me in any way,
and so I am making the decision to ignore it.”
Reading through the list of negative messages one at a time and then politely declining is often a powerful process. It actively rewrites the narrative into an adult framework and helps to gradually diminishes the impact of these unhelpful voices.
Conclusion
Whether we are working to replace the messages that we internalized or politely declining the messages we externalized, engaging in this work often requires tolerating a significant amount of fear and discomfort – even when taking a caring and deliberate pace. This is usually because on some level, the strategies that we used to handle these negative messages provided us with some type of safety during our development, and dismantling those strategies can leave us feeling very unsafe - sometimes even panicked. Ultimately, as challenging as it can be, this work brings with it the potential for enormous relief and the chance to say “Yes, I would talk to someone I love the way I talk to myself”.
Dr. Dan Siegel and Mindsight
If you are interested in reading more on the topic of how to work with your internal narratives, there is a great case study in chapter 12 of the book Mindsight by Dr. Daniel Siegel. In the second half of the chapter he describes the process of working successfully with a patient who had a very difficult, overactive internal voice that was causing all kinds of problems in her life. Dr. Siegel does a great job describing how she slowly negotiates with this troublesome aspect of herself without ever resorting to disowning or banishing it. His approach is based on the premise that every part of us is there for a reason, and that we need to be as loving as possible whenever we are doing internal work. It is a really interesting section of the chapter and provides many insights on how to work with difficult internal voices compassionately and patiently.
Comments? Questions? I would love to hear from you!
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