self-talk
“If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.” – Vincent Van Gogh
Because I’ve had my issues with poor self-talk in my life, I’ve done a fair amount of reading and listening to people who are way smarter than me on the subject. People like Sam Harris, Tony Robbins, and Gary John Bishop have been incredibly helpful in helping me realize how my inner dialogue has shaped my life in some pretty negative ways. it stand out
You might be thinking, hey Kevin, this site is about exercising, why are we going down this weird road? It’s because being consistent with exercise or even creating this website wouldn’t be possible if I hadn’t made a real effort to recognize my self-deprecation and change it.
I need to be clear: I’m not an expert in this in any way. I’m just a man trying to be a better man.
The ideas I’m sharing in this post come from people like those I mentioned above, and from my own experience. If something sounds spot on, it’s almost certainly learned from folks smarter than me. If anything sounds off or like nonsense, that’s on me.
"People are little more than a living conversation, both internal and spoken. A dialogue in a body. A skin-and-bone bag that talks. And it talks about everything. And the limit of that talk is the limit of that life, period." - Gary John Bishop
How Negative Self-Talk Can Take Over Your Life
My best friend is a clinical psychologist whom I’ve known for about 34 years as of today. For years, he’s warned me about the consequences of negative self-talk. I didn’t really take it seriously until later in my life. Unfortunately, by then, a habit had not only formed but was ingrained into my daily life.
It’s a daunting task kicking a habit that comes as naturally as breathing, but I knew I needed to try, not just for me but for my son as well. I’ve learned the hard way that poor self-talk doesn’t only affect me; it touches everyone around me.
Why Taking Action Matters More Than Positive Thinking
I was surprised to learn that most of the talking we do every day is to ourselves. Those self-deprecating, uninvited thoughts seem to come out of nowhere, and it’s difficult to fight something you can’t see coming.
So what do you do? Well, I stopped trying to fight it and started defying it. In other words, I started taking action even when my brain was telling me that I wasn’t smart enough, it was impossible, it was a waste of time, or whatever bullshit story that happened to be crippling me at the time.
It’s an ongoing battle. I haven’t figured it all out, but the one thing that helps me the most is taking some kind of action. I touched on this in my post about finding your routine. When I defy disempowering thoughts by doing something—anything—the thoughts start to shift into something more positive.
I’ve got to be honest, I’m not going around thinking happy, positive thoughts all day. That’s not who I am, and probably never will be. I’ve learned that thoughts are just thoughts. Positive thoughts are nice; they make me feel better than negative thoughts for sure. However, there is a time for thinking and a time for doing.
How Exercise Helped Me Change My Self-Talk
Take exercise, for example. Years ago, there wasn’t a chance in hell I’d be exercising five days a week and writing about it on a website. Consistent workouts and computers? Those were two things I’d failed at and been frustrated by for years. Things have definitely changed.
Please understand that I’m not saying this to impress you, but to impress upon you how much our self-talk guides our lives in ways we don’t even realize. Taking action, even small action, changes the story in your head.
“GET COMFORTABLE WITH BEING UNCOMFORTABLE” –JILLIAN MICHAELS
Building Better Habits One Small Step at a Time
If you’re anything like me, there will come a point where you are going to get bored. You’re going to be dissatisfied with slow results. You might want to take the time you’re spending on exercise and do something else. You might feel the pull back to what author Gary John Bishop calls your default mode. This is where subconscious thoughts want to pull you back to your comfort zone.
I fight this from time to time. After all, I’ve got beer in the fridge, and those Netflix shows ain’t gonna watch themselves. That’s when I have to remind myself that all meaningful change happens in the uncomfortable zone.
For me, step one is to recognize what is happening; discomfort and boredom are triggering old thoughts that are trying to lead me into old behaviors. Step two is to defy those thoughts and continue with my empowering routine anyway.
What I know for sure is this: taking action is what gets shit done, plain and simple.
“The habit of spending nearly every waking moment lost in thought leaves us at the mercy of whatever our thoughts happen to be. Meditation is a way of breaking this spell.” – Sam Harris
Why Meditation Helped Me Stop Believing Every Thought
I’d like to talk a little bit about meditation. Earlier, I told you about my psychologist friend. The one who warned me about poor self-talk. You know, the good advice I didn’t take. For years, he’s talked with me about how meditation is wonderful for balance in a person’s life. Once again, it was good advice I didn’t take until a few months ago. I really should listen to this guy once in a while.
I really wish I had started this years ago. Even though I’m a rookie at this, I’m beginning to understand how random some of our thoughts can be. And quite frankly, how little control we sometimes have over them.. That’s when I started to realize that trying to stop these thoughts was an exercise in futility.
The best thing for me has been to stop fighting the thoughts and recognize them for what they are: just thoughts. They don’t have any power over me unless I give it to them. Meditation has helped me understand where the power is. For me, that power is in my actions, not my thoughts.
summary
I love the opening quote by Vincent Van Gogh. I get it, the dude had issues with the whole ear thing, but he was onto something. I didn’t realize the connection between taking action and better self-talk until I really started to take a hard look at it. I’ll be honest, it ain’t easy. I still struggle with it every day. But I’ve improved enough that people around me have noticed and commented on it.
The way it works for me is to do something first, something my self-talk has told me not to, and force myself to do it anyway. When I started all this, I hadn’t exercised in years. I had no reason to believe, let alone any proof, that I could pull it off. But I started my two-minute workout anyway. It’s amazing how some of that negative noise started to fade when I gave those thoughts the middle finger and defiantly took action. For me, it came out of desperation.. It doesn’t need to be for you.
Ok, you might be thinking, “Wow, Kevin, so all I have to do is fix my negative self-talk that has been on autopilot since birth and start a lifelong exercise commitment that most people on the planet know they should do but won’t. Why don’t we start with something easier, like world peace?” First of all, that’s a good piece of negative self-talk right there. That’s the kind of shit that used to make me crack open another beer and start a new season of Breaking Bad.
Here's the thing: when you break it down into small pieces, like a simple two-minute workout, the ball starts rolling. Then some of that garbage that seemed like the absolute truth will start to fade, or at least you begin to see it in a different light. It’s ok to start this journey without knowing exactly how, or even if it’s all going to work out. We can do this together!