Talk to Yourself Like a Buddhist: Five Mindful Practices to Silence Negative Self-Talk
176
Talk to Yourself Like a Buddhist: Five Mindful Practices to Silence Negative Self-Talk
176Paperback
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Overview
There are hundreds of books, workshops, and classes that teach us how to communicate effectively with others, but very few of us pay attention to how we speak to ourselves.
Best-selling author and communication expert Cynthia Kane believes this is a problem, and she is sounding the alarm! Kane writes that there is an unreported epidemic of negative self-talk in our culture today.
Many of us speak to ourselves in demeaning and hurtful ways, using language we would never use with anyone else. To make matters worse, we often don't even realize when we are doing this, as these old mental tapes play in repeating loops without our awareness.
In Talk to Yourself Like a Buddhist, certified mindfulness and meditation instructor Cynthia Kane introduces the Middle Path of Self-Communication, which consists of five mindful practices—Listen, Explore, Question, Release, and Balance—all of which are grounded in Buddhist principles.
This book will show you how to:
- Identify your negative self-talk and explore the underlying self-judgments that produce it
- Release the judgments that are poisoning your self-communication
- Practice a system of balanced internal communication based on truth and compassion
When we speak to ourselves negatively, we set a tone for our day and our interactions with others in the world. Talk to Yourself Like a Buddhist can teach you how to turn off the enemy in your mind—and create a new relationship with yourself and the world around you—simply by noticing, investigating, and changing the words you use to speak to yourself.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781938289705 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Hierophant Publishing |
| Publication date: | 04/23/2018 |
| Series: | Like a Buddhist |
| Pages: | 176 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.60(d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
What Is Negative Self-Talk and How Does It Manifest in Our Lives?
When I was in the fourth grade, I was introduced to William Shakespeare. While his plays may not have made complete sense to me at the time, his soliloquies stood out. A soliloquy is a speech by a character who is voicing their thoughts aloud, mostly when they are by themselves. A soliloquy reveals the character's innermost beliefs and feelings, but what makes a soliloquy different from a monologue is that no other character can hear what they are saying, whether they are present on stage or not. This is exactly how we are communicating with ourselves all day long — reciting soliloquies.
If you've read any Shakespeare, you may know that many soliloquies bring out the doubts, fears, and insecurities of the characters, often showing a contrast between a public persona and what's actually going on inside the character's mind and heart. And while we aren't characters in one of Shakespeare's plays, our modern-day soliloquies are steeped in the same contexts — much of our internal self-talk is doubtful, fearful, or otherwise negative even if we present ourselves as the opposite.
These self-doubting and fearful soliloquies are good examples of negative self-talk, and in the same ways that they affect and control the lives of Shakespeare's characters, so too do they impact us in our daily lives.
All day long, we're all in near constant dialogue with one person — ourselves. This means that the words we choose have an incredibly powerful effect on how we see the world and ourselves. When this self-talk becomes negative, so do our perceptions of who we are and our place in the world.
Simple statements like "nothing looks right on me today" to the more damaging "I can't do anything right" can affect our day in the same way that dark clouds or rain might affect an otherwise sunny day. For some of us, even times of accomplishment and celebration can be usurped by negative thoughts. For instance, have you ever been congratulated on a job well done, only to downplay your accomplishments or point out the issues with what you've achieved? Thoughts like "Well, it's not perfect but it's a start" to "It wasn't that big a deal" are subtle ways that we denigrate our accomplishments and ourselves through our self-talk.
Even something as simple as getting into the shower and noticing that there's no soap can lead to a hurtful dialogue with yourself. Rather than saying something like, "Oops! No big deal, I'll get it tomorrow," we turn on ourselves in times of simple oversights like this one, moving straight to statements such as "Why didn't I remember to get more soap? How could I be so stupid? Why do I always do this?" The truth is that most of us wouldn't talk to our spouse, our children, our friends, or even our worst enemies in this degrading way, but for some reason, our minds think that it's perfectly fine to wield that kind of negative, hurtful language against ourselves.
If this is how I'm talking to myself in my morning shower, I've already changed how I see the world. My shower, which has the potential to be a rejuvenating and refreshing experience, has suddenly turned my mood to one of frustration and irritation. If my shower has already clouded my mood, imagine what a potential chore breakfast will be, or ironing my clothes, or packing my lunch — and that's before I even make it to work, where I have to interact with other people! Left unchecked, this type of negative self-talk can be a prelude to the statement, "I'm just having one of those days."
This is a simple example of how our self-talk can provide the backdrop for our day, like an internal weather forecast. When the forecast is negative, we are creating the atmospheric conditions for a bad day even before that day has started.
While speaking poorly to ourselves in the shower can set us up for a bad day, repeating "I can't do anything right" to ourselves day after day after day isn't just setting us up for a bad day or week; it's subtly paving the path for us to see our entire life through that lens of "I can't do anything right." If you begin to believe your negative self-talk, or the judgment of "I can't do anything right," your entire life will be affected negatively. If you can't do anything right, why bother applying for a new job? Why go out on that first date? Why would you even ask someone out if you're certain that you'd just muck it up in the end?
And here is another problem in this scenario, perhaps the biggest one of all: many of the people I work with wouldn't have recognized that soliloquy in the shower or the resulting follow-up as an example of negative self-talk. The truth is, we often speak to ourselves in subtle negative ways without even understanding that we're doing it. As a result, much of our internal negative self-talk slides past our radar without us realizing the damage we are doing to ourselves in the process.
Of course, other soliloquies are anything but subtle when it comes to negativity. Standing in front of the mirror and harshly criticizing some part of your body would be a common example. Almost everyone has spoken negatively to themselves about an aspect of their physical appearance at one point in their lives. Self-talk around physical appearance may range from "My nose is too big" or "my thighs are too fat" all the way to "I'm ugly and unlovable."
When I first meet with a client, they will sometimes tell me they don't consider this body shaming to be an example of negative self-talk. Rather, they argue that these judgments are "factual." As you will see when we go deeper into the practices, none of these types of judgments are true; they are all subjective. In this way, you can see how even our overt self-criticism and the damage it causes can go unnoticed.
Other overt negative soliloquies arise from past life events, usually from the experiences we regret or that have left us with unresolved emotions. Examples include divorce, the loss of a job, failing out of school, the time you betrayed a friend, or when you had a serious financial setback.
Overt negative self-talk can also arise from the experiences we suffered at the hands of others. Rape and sexual assault victims often say they carry a feeling of unworthiness or shame, as do the victims of child abuse and other abusive relationships (this includes emotional, mental, and physical abuse). In addition to giving us fodder for overt negative self-talk, the negative self-talk that can develop out of these experiences can also be subtle, as many of its victims don't often realize all the ways in which they have punished themselves for the actions of others.
Negative self-talk that grows loud enough can not only make for an unhappy daily existence, but if left unchecked, it can lead to other, more serious conditions. For example, if you spend enough time telling yourself that you are a horrible person, that you are unworthy of love and friendship, you may develop a tendency to isolate yourself from others, which can lead to depression, anxiety, and even to incidents of self-harm. In these instances, seeing a counselor or other professional is crucial.
We will look at all of the above examples of negative self-talk and their manifestations throughout this book, but for now I ask that you be open to investigating all the ways negative self-talk can appear in your life, including ways you had not previously considered. That is because, as shown in our previous examples, the ways in which negative self-talk manifests can be both subtle and overt. When it's subtle, many of us can have difficulty spotting it, often because we've grown so accustomed to this dialogue that we no longer notice it.
The Buddhist Connection
Buddhism is often understood as a path to eliminate or lessen the suffering in our lives. We often think that suffering arises from forces beyond our control, with old age, sickness, and death being the examples originally pointed to by the Buddha in his discourse on suffering. But the truth is, we create a lot of unnecessary suffering in our lives long before old age, sickness, or death take their toll, simply by the way we communicate with ourselves.
If my internal soliloquy tells me that everything in my life is in upheaval and nothing is going how I planned it, then this negative picture will be reflected in how I feel and the interactions I have with others, and will shape how I see the world.
More to the point, if I tell myself that my life is miserable, then you guessed it — I'm going to suffer. In fact, I have found that speaking to yourself in this negative way isn't just a cause of suffering, it is suffering itself.
But we can lessen the suffering in our lives right now, by changing the way we communicate with ourselves, and examining the beliefs and judgments that provide the ammunition for our negative self-talk.
From a Buddhist perspective, negative self-talk can be defined as language you use when you communicate with yourself that is unkind, unhelpful, or untrue. It's when you speak to yourself in a way that diminishes your very being. This can be in ways that are big and obvious (like when you judge and berate your body), or little and hard to spot (like when you subtly compare yourself to someone else and decide you aren't "enough").
Negative self-talk is language that promotes suffering. As you will see later in the practices, it is largely based on misperceptions of what is true. Negative self-talk occurs when you speak to yourself in thought, word, or action in a way that leaves you feeling sad, upset, or mad at yourself. In this way, negative self-talk occurs anytime we address ourselves with language that creates suffering in our minds.
Later in this book we will look at practices we can undertake in order to lessen the suffering caused by negative self-talk, but I'd like to briefly discuss where we are headed. In my first book, How to Communicate Like a Buddhist, I offered the following litmus test for our words when communicating with other people. While How to Communicate Like a Buddhist was designed to help you in communication with others, these questions are also important when communicating with yourself.
• Is what I am about to say to someone else true?
• Is it helpful?
• Is it kind?
It can be very easy to answer these questions when you're in conversation with another person, because you have an opportunity to pause or stop before you speak, but when it comes to communicating with yourself, things get a little trickier.
Because of the rapid succession of thoughts that occur in our minds, most of us do not have that same ability to pause before communicating with ourselves. Because of this, our questions change slightly, reflecting our ability to observe what we are thinking or saying. With this distinction, here are the questions we can ask when evaluating our self-talk:
• Is the language I am using with myself right now true?
• Is it helpful?
• Is it kind?
These questions are our mantra on the Middle Path to Self-Communication.
For convenience, I often refer to our thoughts in relation to self-communication, but this is not the only way we communicate with ourselves. Let's take a moment to examine all the modes we use, as understanding them will better help us identify our negative self-talk in all its manifestations.
The Four Modes of Self-Communication
The four modes of self-communication are the how involved in "how do we communicate with ourselves?" As we begin to define what negative self-talk is, we will also take a look at some examples of how it manifests in each of the different modes. Some of you may be surprised to learn that you have communicated to yourself negatively in a way you did not expect or did not realize. Most everyone does so via the first means — through thinking — but the truth is that most of us will employ some if not all of the other three from time to time.
1. Thinking
2. Speaking aloud
3. Body language
4. The written word
Thinking
The most obvious way that we negatively talk to ourselves is with our thoughts. It would be great if all our thoughts were true, kind, and helpful, but in reality they are not. I read somewhere that many of the thoughts we experience throughout the day are repetitive. If this is true, it means that many of us are thinking the same negative thoughts over and over. If these thoughts are directed at ourselves, we are often creating the suffering we are experiencing.
Because thoughts are the number one source of negative self-talk, we will dive deeper into why we have these negative thoughts and where they come from in the chapters that follow. As you will see, most of our negative thoughts are not facts; they are judgments and opinions based on past experiences, beliefs, cultural norms, socialization, and a handful of other factors. The practices that make up the Middle Path of Self-Communication invite us to examine the difference between the thoughts that are fact-based and those that are subjective judgments, and give us the tools to shift our internal worldview to a more evidence-based, balanced stance.
Speaking Aloud
Usually we consider speaking aloud as a mode reserved for communicating with others, but if you've ever talked to yourself when no one was around, you've spoken to yourself aloud.
If you are one of the many people who talks to yourself, my guess is that not everything you have ever said to yourself out loud was kind, truthful, or helpful. There are a few key ways of identifying negativ eself-talk when you are speaking to yourself aloud. When I work with clients, the first words they notice themselves speaking aloud are usually some form of self-criticism: "I can't believe I just did that!" or "I should know better" or "I ought to be able to do this by now." Other clients of mine have noticed they will outright scold themselves when alone, saying things like "I am so stupid" or other self-deprecating statements.
Another way we can engage in negative self-talk is when we speak to others. This may surprise you, but think about it for a moment. How often have you "confessed" what you really think about yourself to a close friend or confidant? Perhaps you have told a friend "I am such a loser" or "I'm so ugly, no one would want to go out with me." Even if your friend tries to convince you that your statement isn't true, you have already spoken negatively about yourself, and you have heard these words as well.
The next time you find yourself speaking to yourself when alone or about yourself to others, I invite you to bring awareness to what you're saying. Are your words true, helpful, and kind? Or do you speak harshly to yourself? If you find it's the latter, don't beat yourself up for having negative self-talk, thus perpetuating the problem. Simply notice it for now, as becoming aware of it is the first step to change.
Body Language
Many times our body language is a product of what we are thinking or saying; thus, this mode of self-communication is related to the first two on the list. It is important to notice the subtle messages we can convey to ourselves through how we hold and use our body when we are speaking or thinking negatively about ourselves.
For instance, when I was going through my meditation and mindfulness certification, one of the exercises we did was close our eyes and imagine ourselves in a stressful situation, and then watch how our bodies responded to stress. For me, my muscles tightened and I became rigid. My heart beat faster and my breathing was shallow.
After that training, I began to notice how my body behaved when I spoke negatively to myself through thought or aloud. I noticed how I would throw my hands up in the air, shake my head, or sometimes even stomp my feet like a three-year-old when I was self-scolding. I was using my body language to reinforce the negative messages I was sending through my thoughts and words.
Think about how you hold your body when you get mad at yourself, or when you feel insecure, ashamed, fearful, or frustrated. Do you slump your shoulders? Do you look down at your feet? Oftentimes you are holding a pose without awareness of the messages you are sending yourself in the process.
The Written Word
The final way we can talk to ourselves negatively is one that most people don't think of: the written word. The classic New Year's resolution is a fantastic example of this. We start the year excited for our goals, but so often our list of resolutions quickly becomes a yardstick that we measure against ourselves. If we don't reach the results we hoped for, we look at the list and add comments about ourselves that aren't positive.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Talk to Yourself Like a Buddhist"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Cynthia Kane.
Excerpted by permission of Hierophant Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Introduction 1
Chapter 1 What Is Negative Self-Talk and How Does It Manifest in Our Lives? 11
Chapter 2 Judgment: The Accomplice of Negative Self-Talk 29
Chapter 3 The Middle Path of Self-Communication Overview 49
Chapter 4 The Practice of Listening 55
Chapter 5 The Practice of Exploration 69
Chapter 6 The Practice of Questioning 91
Chapter 7 The Practice of Releasing 109
Chapter 8 The Practice of Balance 129
Afterword 155
Acknowlegments 161
About the Author 163
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