Sep 7, 2022
The Delicate Act of Self Talk and Introspection
Why is self-talk crucial?
You’ll see various aspects of your life improve when you become more aware of yourself and how you interact with the world and others who live in it. Your perspective will broaden; realizing that others have different needs, thoughts, or experiences enables you to have an enhanced empathic response. If you gain a greater sense of how your behaviour affects others, it’ll be easier to restrain anti-social impulses.
You are probably conscious of the inner voice providing you with an endless monologue about your daily routine. It can be cheerful, supportive or negative and self-destructive. Sure it is helpful to have an inner critique, and it can elevate awareness of internal and external obstacles, which is essential for achievement.
To self-reflect is to learn more about your fundamental purpose and motives. Introspection draws attention to our mindset and behaviours, intending to become more self-aware. There are two different modes of introspection. One attempts to find the solutions to problems through strategy, and the other tries to understand and dissipate adverse emotional reactions. Self-reflection revolving around our negative experiences is less likely to yield positive results than introspection orientated toward goals and proactive strategy formation.
Hi, my name is Jason, the type of madman who’s spent way too long talking to himself instead of other people. In the past, I had low self-esteem, and during those times of my life, I was my worst enemy.
Why introspection is so challenging
As we venture toward self-knowledge, it is common for us to introspect. Many of us are confident in our perceptions of ourselves, but there are many reasons why this confidence may be ill-founded. It’s tough to assess our personalities and motivations accurately. Even if you can, it takes more than just self-knowledge to reset all of the neural wiring responsible for our subconscious habits.
The mind assigns specific processes to the subconscious so that it can function more efficiently and quickly; the compromise is that we sacrifice a lot of autonomy over those processes. We cannot access the subconscious regions of our minds as we please. When we interpret our subconscious mind, we make up information because we’re searching for answers we do not have immediate access to. When we don’t know the answer to something, we’re likely to make one up based on the information we have, even if it is insufficient.
Introspection can easily be corrupted through bias, especially the inclination to see ourselves in a favourable light, the tendency to interpret events in alignment with previous beliefs and expectations, and the need for self-consistency. It is difficult to correct or become aware of these biases, especially in the heat of the moment; similarly, it is difficult to identify situations that will trigger your cognitive biases.
Even when we are informed and motivated to think clearer, unbiased thoughts, the difficulty won’t cease. If you attempt to assess your bias through self-talk, your failure to identify them will trick you into believing you are impartial. Alternatively, even if we are aware of our skewed judgements, it is still difficult to assess the severity of their effects on our perception.
Another side effect of our cognitive biases is that we will often lie to ourselves; this is a significant obstacle to having a constructive inner dialogue. It’s funny we lie to ourselves to avoid painful realities, but In doing so, we damage our chances of happiness. Sure we’d like to believe that we’re free from quirks, deviant thoughts, or odd interests, but this is of no real benefit. Introspection done wrong can lead you further away from your true self.
Minimizing Negative Self Talk
When you reflect on yourself, ensure you have the time and mental energy to think well. You’re more susceptible to bias if you’ve got too much on your mind or have limited time for self-reflection. While you introspect, focus on your immediate emotional responses to a given situation and be prepared to cross-examine your gut feelings, preconceived notions, and how the situation unfolded.
The first part of minimizing negative self-talk is identifying when it is active, which can be extremely difficult. Think carefully; would you allow another person to talk to you about how you speak to yourself? Would you talk to a child or friend the way you talk to yourself? Negative self-talk becomes excessively damaging when left unchallenged; cross-examination is necessary. Most harmful introspective thoughts result from exaggerated personal bias; you must shift this negativity to neutrality before it becomes unproductive. Just as failure to remain grounded can make you delusional, a failure to acknowledge your strengths and good qualities is equally as irrational. Perhaps you need to start saying things aloud; self-talk often remains unchallenged because no one else can hear it; give other people a chance to tell you differently.
Positive thinking and optimism can be helpful for stress management and improving your quality of life. Positivity will reframe the way you look at stressful situations. The optimist mindset grants you the mental rigour to cope with hardship or challenges and be more efficient and creative with your problem-solving. Laughter can relieve stress and tension; when you need a boost, try and humour yourself. I have always found the best types of comedy to be those derived from trauma, hardship, or pain (Kevin hart’s stand-up “laugh at my pain” comes to mind).
Consequences of Negative Self-Talk
Self-talk needs to be monitored closely. It is easy to become too critical and constantly second-guess yourself instead of finding solutions to your problems. Your inner voice should widen your view of the world and your life rather than focusing on threats or shortcomings. Often we fixate on our pasts, concentrate on things that did not go too well and project onto our future, imagining that things will never go well for us. We should focus on the present, the things that are right In front of us.
A massive problem with negative self-talk is that it often doesn’t reflect reality, so it can leave you trapped in helplessness for no good reason. If you’re depressed or have anxiety, you’d be prone to dysfunctional self-talk. It is easy to confuse this cynical introspection with honesty, checking your ego, or preparing you for disappointment, but it is not. If you’re like me and have quite an obsessive mind, keeping your mind from negative thoughts can be challenging.
Your inner critique can be a helpful voice guiding you towards your goals. When the inner voice becomes too harsh, it is no longer a tool but a source of pain. Worry, negativity, and fear create a negative feedback loop that will adversely affect your performance; worrying will make you perform worse, giving you more reason to worry. Your ability to believe in yourself will be minimal as you’d constantly tell yourself that you are incompetent. It makes you less likely to strive for positive life changes and less likely to see or capitalize on any opportunities presented to you.
It is a source of stress, but not just for you, and it can indirectly affect the people around you if you tend to project your internalized negativity. Similarly, negative feelings can leave you insecure, constantly seeking validation from others, making you needy; this is very exhausting for the people in your life.
Sometimes we can be overly cautious of the background ideas, the noise telling us that certain feelings are unacceptable; these notions are often installed in us early on in our lives. Emotions we haven’t got a handle on can fuel unproductive compulsive behaviours, from procrastination to addictions, all because we have found no better way of processing our emotions.
Yes, looking inward can get to a point where it is no longer healthy, but this doesn’t mean that we should just be pushing forward without taking the time to reflect because it is helpful to be aware of how your past is affecting your present. Sure, you could be going through a rough patch, a financial crisis, relationship drama, trauma or abuse, but you need to think hard. What else could you be doing? Is obsessing over yourself the most proactive use of your time for improving your quality of life?
