“Self-talk reflects your innermost feelings.” — Asa Don Brown
Practice kindness. Be kind to others. These are all great words of advice that are eagerly passed around from person to person. Being kind to others is important, but it’s only half the battle. We also need to be kind to ourselves, which like most pieces of advice, is easier said than done.
How often have you made judgemental remarks towards yourself? It could be about your weight, perceived level of intelligence, work ethic, social skills, budgeting, or many other ideas. Many of us say things like ‘How could I be so stupid?’ without realizing the impacts it has on those around us as well as ourselves.
When we fill our minds with negative self-talk, we eat away at our own self-confidence, self-esteem, and our self-worth. Not only does this harm your ability to stay motivated, but it also makes being with yourself less enjoyable and can even influence how others act and behave.
To change the negative self-talk, we have to change the conversations we have inside our minds. Try a few of these replacements and see how you feel.
Say ‘thank you’ instead of ‘sorry’
When we say sorry, often times it emphasizes the negative characteristics. Saying ‘sorry I’m late’, emphasizes that we were late, saying ‘sorry I took up so much of your time’ makes us think that we aren’t worthy of spending time with another person. All of these emphasized messages give us more fuel to add to our negative self-talk inferno. Instead, thank people for their positive actions. If we are late but say ‘thanks for waiting’ it places the focus on the other person and pays them a compliment. Using this strategy can help us see the positive qualities in others, and improve our relationships. This doesn’t mean we should never apologize if we did something that was harmful to others, but experiment with this idea and use it when appropriate.
Turn problems into opportunities.
We all have problems, yet we tend to give them more attention than they deserve. If we focus on how overweight we are, saying ‘i am so overweight’ will just make us feel bad about ourselves and make us victims in the situation. What if we were to say ‘I would like to lose a few pounds. What’s an activity I enjoy that can help me improve my health?’ This approach allows us to practice more self-kindness, and come up with solutions to our problems rather than sulk in them.
Do something you enjoy without guilt.
As our to-do lists continue to expand, so does our temptation to do something that we enjoy. It could be watching Netflix, going on Facebook, spending time with friends, or reading a book. Sometimes, we like to get away from all the work and indulge in enjoyable activities more than we want to allow ourselves. We have all gone on the internet with the intention of spending five minutes when we actually spend a couple hours. This leaves us feeling guilty and stressed as we spent too much time, instead of being able to relax and destress from the fun activity. Try setting a specific amount of time for the fun activity so it can be done without guilt or stress. For best results, try working on a fun project you’ve been intending to do, or reading your favorite book or taking a walk.
Replacing negative self-talk with self-kindness is difficult because we have replaced the idea of ‘self-love’ with the word ‘selfish’.
When you begin to practice self-kindness and remove the negative self-talk, you see that it’s not selfish at all. By being kind to ourselves, we strengthen our ability to practice kindness towards others and help those around us. Better yet, we set a good example for those around us, and give those we love some encouragement to love themselves too.
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