Just a quick blog post today but I wanted to share a bit about something which I am becoming more and more aware of:
Self Talk; specifically negative self talk. I have read a couple of books. One in particular which resonated with me was You are a Badass which is all about conquering self doubt and becoming the best version of yourself.
Self doubt and negative self talk can end up consuming you. It can start with a thought in the morning like ‘I’m always late’ or ‘I am always losing things’ and the negativity will start to breed and can take over your whole day. These are actually common thoughts I have at the start of the day and it stems down to something which I know I can easily change; my organisation skills and getting up earlier.
I am the kind of person who can be organised or get up early when I know that I absolutely have to. Like years ago when I was a teacher I would be up and out by 7.20am because I wanted to get my admin done prior to starting my day. I also manage to organise my equipment when I am going to see a client. However, when it comes to getting the kids to gymnastics on time or knowing where my keys are it’s a different story.
Therefore sometimes the best way to stop the negative self talk in situations like that is to take simple steps to preventing the situations-like getting up ten minutes earlier or having a specific place to put the keys.
The trickier negative self talk to ditch is that about our personal qualities and abilities. Things like ‘I have no friends’ , ‘I attract one idiot after another’ or ‘nothing every goes right for me’. These are harder to hit on the head as they are instilled in us by our experiences, sometimes right from childhood.
When we have a limiting belief like this which is deep routed, we go around looking for things all the time which confirm this belief. We also end up attracting these situations a it is the view we are putting out there.
For me the first step in challenging this is recognising when we are having a negative belief and acknowledging it. A tip I recently read in Katie Piper’s new book Confidence is to have a word which shuts down the negative thought and stops it in its tracks. It’s best to make it a neutral word and it can be something really random and funny. Mine is ‘Sausages’ .
This word is then your trigger to turn that belief around. Tell yourself the complete opposite. Even if you don;t believe it one bit. Once you start doing this you feel so much better.
The same goes with if you have to do something which you don’t want to do-sometimes for me it is simple things like emptying the cat litter tray or cleaning the bathroom. Nothing can change the fact you have to do it, the only thing which you have any control over is the attitude you have about it. You have a choice about whether to go about it in a positive way or negative complaining way. If it’s a really yucky task like cleaning the bathroom focus on the outcome-‘once it is done it’s done for another week and I can enjoy looking at a clean sparkling sink instead of one full of toothpaste stains.
So anyway, I will be writing a bit more about this as I look into this further but it’s an ongoing thing which I am working on and I think it’s something which can help anyone to ‘enhance’ their lives even in the smallest ways.
xxx
