Changing Negative Self Talk to Positive Self Talk

Negative vs. Positive Self Talk

Self talk is what we say to ourselves throughout the course of the day, both out loud and in our heads.  Each and every one of us has an ongoing dialogue in our head that impacts our daily lives.  These words can take two forms – negative and positive. 

Negative Self Talk

Negative self talk affects us in many ways.  It can lead to depression, stagnation, self pity, and many other negative influences.   All of these combined lead us to not live our best possible life.  Some examples of Negative self talk are:

“I am fat”

“I don’t have the smarts to be promoted”

“Money is not my strong suit”

“Everyone else is better at it than I am”

When we repeat a negative statement over and over again we begin to believe it.  When we say “I am not good enough” we may let it affect us by not taking steps to achieve a goal that we are qualified to do.  For example, you may not apply for a promotion that you qualify for because you have already convinced yourself you are not good enough.  Eventually you will begin to dislike your job, your company and yourself because you will not allow yourself to grow.  This becomes like a snowball and affects other areas of our life.  Your negative self talk about the job then carries to other things related to yourself such as exercise.  Changing to positive statements makes our lives better, and assists us in moving forward to achieve our goals.

Positive Self Talk

Positive self talk on the other hand can lead a person to live the best life that they can.  If instead of saying you are not good enough you say “I can do this”.  Not only will you achieve your goals, but you will be happier and healthier.  Positive self talk gives you a permanent cheerleader in your corner!  One that carries positive messages to all areas of your life and helps you move forward.  Other examples include:

“I love and honor my body”

“I am good at my job and have the skills necessary to move forward”

“I am a quick learner and can tackle new areas”

“I am wonderful”

Source of Self Talk

 How do we form our self talk?  The way we talk to ourselves comes from our beliefs.  Beliefs form our opinions about our world and ourselves.  Our beliefs originate from the way our parents raised us and what they communicated to us plus additional life experiences.  If we grew up being told we were shy and that shy is bad, we will believe that and turn that belief into a negative self talk.  For example, you may tell yourself you are a bad public speaker because you are shy.  So you proceed to tell yourself “I cannot do this”, and then may prevent yourself from reaching your full potential by not engaging in situations that require you to speak in public or even just to smaller groups in your daily life.  These beliefs can also come from life experiences.  Say you had a boyfriend who consistently told you you were fat.  You would begin to internalize that and make it real for you and then proceed to repeat that to yourself, even if that were completely untrue. 

So how do you change from Negative to Positive self talk?

Changing from negative to positive self talk is more than just reworking your words.  It requires acknowledgement that you are even engaging in self talk, adjusting our beliefs and then reshaping the way we talk to ourselves.

Step 1. You must first determine when you are engaging in self talk.  You can do this many ways, but here are a few that might help.

• Slow down your day and pay attention to what you say to yourself.  We tend to be so busy that we don’t have the time to listen to what we are doing and watch how it affects us.  When we slow down to allow ourselves space to observe we can often move forward faster in the future because we know what is driving us.  This is especially important when working on a big decision or area in your life.  For example when doing your monthly budget take the time to notice what you are telling yourself as you do the budget.  If you write down a savings goal of $1,000 and you immediately say “yah right” stop and write that down so you know that you are jeopardizing that possibility.
• Monitor your body’s reaction to different situations.  Tensing up may be an indication that you are telling yourself something different than you are acting on. 
• Journal, this is good for after the event has happened.  Get on to paper what was going through your head as you encountered a particular situation.  For example, perhaps you did not honor your own boundary during an encounter with your mother.   Begin a journal page on analyzing what you were saying to yourself while you were allowing this to happen.  It can also be done in conjunction with the above two discovery ideas to get to the core of what the self talk was.

Step 2. Once we determine what our self talk is saying we need to adjust the beliefs behind the statement.  We cannot believe our new positive statements if we have not changed the underlying belief or beliefs.  This will involve digging deep into our beliefs, how they came about, how they are affecting us and are they really true.  Finally reshaping the belief to fit our reality today.  So for our example of your parents telling you that you are shy, you need to acknowledge that they came from childhood, grasp the full scope of how they are affecting us and then make a determination for ourselves on whether shy is bad or not.  Shy may for you be good because otherwise you have a tendency to jump into situations too quickly.  Then we need to reshape that belief to shy is a good slow down mechanism for us. 

Many beliefs we may not even realize that we have, or may even come in layers of beliefs.  There are some different tools that we can use to fully understand what is behind the negative talk.

• Journal – a great way to allow ourselves the ability to explore deeper than we would just talking.
• Talk to a coach or counselor – often times it helps to see the situation from another’s perspective.
• Meditate – guided meditation is especially good for uncovering the belief behind the statement and to find hidden beliefs.

Step 3. After you know what you are saying and why you are saying that, you can begin to reshape the way you talk to yourself. 

• Begin with one of your statements and alter it to a positive statement.  “I am fat” may become “I love and care about my body”. 
• Make it a habit of saying the new statement repeatedly with enthusiasm and conviction.  In the beginning it may require setting aside time to let that statement sink in. 
• When you catch yourself saying a negative statement, stop and ask yourself if you would talk to a friend or loved one like that?  Many times we are meaner to ourselves than we would ever dream of being to a friend.  Then rephrase the statement to a positive one.

While adjusting our self talk, you may need to return to the previous steps to continue to work on changing the beliefs that are behind the talk and discovering new negative talks to work on. 

Eventually you will surround yourself with positive thoughts and that will create an environment that will allow you to live your best possible life.

Reach your Goals with small steps, small times and consistency

Many times we find ourselves overwhelmed with the prospect of reaching our goals.  We become focused on the achievement of the goal and try to accomplish it by going for it all at once.   We focus on the loose 20 pounds by December instead of loose two pounds this week.  This makes us feel like we are constantly working on that goal and yet not getting anywhere.  This leads to feeling defeated and wanting to stop since we don’t seem to be reaching our goals even though we are working on them!  So how do we change that?  Three easy steps: focus on the basics, take life in small segments and be consistent! 

When looking at the basics of a goal you take the smallest task that will get you to your goal and then do that.  By breaking our goals down to small basic steps we can make our goals to become a reality.  So instead of loose 20 pounds we focus on walk 40 minutes a day and not eating junk food.

Take life in small segments; break your day down to 15 minute sections.  You can get that 40 minutes of exercise in if you focus on just getting a few minutes done at a time.  It is much easier to say I am going to avoid junk food for fifteen minutes than it is to say the whole day.  Plus, once you start something you tend to stick with it after about 10 minutes. 

The third ingredient is to do the small things consistently.  You need to walk at least five days a week and eat healthy multiple days to see any affect.  You cannot try and achieve your goals for one or two days and wonder why it did not work.  It is the repetition of the activity over time that will get us to our goals.

You can achieve your goals, it just takes the time to plan the small steps, the will to focus on the here and now and the discipline to do it every day!  In no time you will be on your way!

Do You Dream Big Enough?

Do you dream big enough?

This question came to me after a morning of reflection.  I was day dreaming about what I wanted my life to look like and something within me told me to dream bigger than I was,  I had not gone far enough yet with my visions.  So I pressed myself to expand my horizons and soon enough I was imaging more than I ever thought possible for me.  Then the big breakthrough came – a great idea for a new business.  As I continued to dreams about it and jot down the ideas I encouraged myself to dream even further about how this could get accomplished without me putting it on my idea list and having it sit there for six years.  I was shocked and amazed at how quickly this one idea began to transform my life vision.  All this because I allowed myself to go further into the process of dreaming than I ever had before.  This led me to asking “Do you dream big enough” and quickly followed by “Why not”?  What I came up with was fear and lack of imagination were the reasons our dreams do not grow as far as they should.    

Fear stopped me because what if I dreamed something and it did not come true?  What if someone made fun of my dreams for being too over the top?  What if my family was not on board with my vision?  The what if’s seemed to be endless.  Often when dreaming we become victims of the fear of failure and the fear of leaving our comfort zone, so we stop right before we truly reach our ideal vision. 

I had dreamed just to the point I knew I could achieve everything, it might be tough to get there but at least I knew I could do it.  I did not have to worry that I might not get there and thus be a failure.  But is failure really all that bad?  Failure teaches us what does not work, and provides valuable lessons to move forward with what can work.  Failure can be the universes way of pointing us in the right direction, leading us to our true path which can only be achieved by living through failures.  Would I be a coaching today if I had not taken my various career paths that seemed to continually end with no direction? Maybe, but the fact that they all seemed to be the wrong career for me enabled me to reach my dream job by expanding my horizons and helping me narrow down what worked and what did not!  How is that a failure when it leads to the best career for me?

I also dreamed just to the point where I did not have to leave my comfort zone or the comfort zone of my family.  If I stayed in the comfort zone then I did not have to fear the judgments of others so I was safe.  But was I really?  What good is living by the judgment of others?  Does it allow you to live your dreams?  If you are going to dream then why stop at the point others will be happy?  The point of dreaming is that YOU are happy beyond your wildest dreams.  To get to this point you must dream beyond your comfort zone, when others see how happy you are they will follow.   

How does lack of imagination stop you from dreaming about the best life possible for you?  Imagination is forming an idea or vision of something that does not exist for you.  So if you have never experienced your life vision then how can you imagine it?  It is almost a catch 22 scenario, how do you know what to dream if you can’t perceive it?  In steps imagination, this allows you to go beyond what you know to create new dreams. 

So how do you move beyond fear and lack of imagination? 

First you must leave your fear zone.  How do you do this?  You take your goal or vision and continue to push it one step further and feel the emotions as you continue to envision that goal.  Begin by taking on goals that you already have established and take it one step further from where you have it.  So if your goal is to be able to run 3 miles by the end of the year, imagine what running four miles by the end of the year would feel like.  As you step further into your dream feel the fear and embrace it, only then can you look it head on and move forward.  Go on it is just a dream you cannot get hurt in a dream; you may be amazed at how quickly the fear moves away!  Continue to practice doing this until it becomes second nature!

Second, begin to work on your imagination by letting your mind wander while gently prodding yourself to go further.  Begin by building your dream and then ask yourself “what next”, follow that with “then what” and keep asking yourself “then what” until your vision grows bigger than you ever thought possible. Eventually your mind will run wild and create more than you expected.  Remember to give it time and don’t let it stop, just keep asking “then what”.   Allow yourself the time and space to really get into your dream.  You will know when it is the right stopping point as it will feel right, I know that sounds odd, but when you hit it you will know it, just like you know home!

Soon you will be able to say YES I dream big enough and be able to move forward to achieving them!

To let go of a goal or not…

Most of us are taught that you should set a goal and go for it until you achieve it.  Is this really a beneficial way to succeed?  I personally do not believe so.  Many times half way through a goal I will realize that it is the wrong goal, or that it needs a small change to really make it my goal.  We change as we grow and learn, so how can the goal that was right for us 4 months, 6 months or 2 years ago be the right goal now?  Goals should be ours, which means they should change as we do.  This is not wimping out or being weak – it is strength to admit we were headed in the wrong direction and that we need to move forward.  Does this mean if we are not achieving something that we automatically change the goal?  NO, it does mean we need to evaluate why we are not meeting that goal and take steps to solve the problem.  That could mean a new goal or a new approach to reaching that goal.  Your goals are your goals: adjust them, rewrite them and achieve them in a way that works for you!

Having patience and intention with Money

One of the hardest issues with money is having discipline and intention with money.  Most of us were raised in an environment where we were taught that you deserve anything you want when you want it.  Unfortunately that is not the path to success with money.      

Being intentional and patient with money has been on my mind a lot lately, with all the market and economy in turmoil and all the snow that we have gotten lately!  SNOW?!  Yes, snow makes me think of being intentional with our money because my car is awful in the snow.  Every year when it snows I talk about buying a new car.  (It is more like bitching about needing a new car, just ask my sister she get the pleasure of hearing it every year.)  So you may wonder why I have not made the move to a different car in the past six years.  Because we are very deliberate with our money, we have two very specific long range goals (have a beach house and retire early) that we gear most of our decisions towards.  We know that we cannot get there in our desired timeframe without doing the necessary planning and forgoing of stuff now.  So how do we handle being intentional with our money? 

1.    Taking lots of time on big purchases – I would have had a new car on Monday night if we did not have a belief to do things slowly.  Stop and ask yourself do you really need this, how else can this money be used, is it a want or need – really grill yourself like a coach or financial planner would.  Most of the time you can talk yourself out of the purchase.

2.    Cash rule – we do all major purchases with cash, no debt for us.  This really makes you think about your purchases, it is harder to spend cash out of your bank account than to sign up for payments.  I had to stop and think if a new car for the handful of times that is snows was a smart move with our cash; the car is fabulous every other day of the year so why waste the money! 

3.    Long term planning – every year we sit down and decide what projects we would like to do with our cash AFTER we invest what we need to in order to reach our goals.  Sometimes this means putting wants on a list that may not get done that year.  For example, we have wanted new kitchen counter tops, back splash and a new sink for going on 4 years now.  But it never quite makes the list of projects even though we really want them.  Using credit or not investing money takes us away from our goals not to them, and the planning helps keep us on task.

4.     Adjust our planning when the unexpected happens.  We had planned on doing the kitchen this past summer, but on June 27^th were hit by a storm that caused damage that our insurance company was not going to cover (that is an entirely different blog post to rant about).  So we had to sit down and redo our list of wants to pay for the damage that was not covered.  Doing this allowed us to manage the unexpected without adding debt or stress to our lives.  We keep our list year round in the order of when we want to do it and how much it will take so that when we need to it is just a quick review and adjustment.

5.    Build in fun and wants to our list.  Our list includes things we enjoy so that we do not feel like it is all work and no play!  We love to travel, so part of our planning includes a good vacation budget every year.

6.    Allow room for error – if we make a mistake with our money we forgive ourselves and readjust to get back on track.  Small mistakes are not worth beating ourselves up over.  So we forgive and move on.

I encourage you to be intentional with your money in the New Year.  Set goals and really focus on achieving them – even if it means making hard decisions about where your money is spent.  Financial health is possible for everyone with a little bit of attention to your finances!

Hello world!

This is my first official blog for Smart Step!  I am both excited and a bit stressed.  The thought of saying something meaningful on a regular basis can be very scary.  But I know that the best way to make progress is to just move forward!

My coaching practice is all about determining what you want your life to look like and then making it happen.  Mainly focusing on balance issues for professionals who mainly focus on work.  Both my husband and I fall into this category and it has taken me years to figure out how to manage what I want and my expectations of what can be accomplished.  For many years I focused so hard on achieving work goals that I would work very long days.  My health – mental and physical health waivered, my spiritual life came and went.  Since both my husband and I worked long hours it was easier to not let that become lost.  Then we had Max, my adorable patience testing 3 year old.  All of a sudden the lifestyle did not work for me, but I struggled to focus on what I really wanted and struggled to adjust my lifestyle.  Why?  Because I did not know what I really wanted out of life.  Not what my 15, 18 or 25 year old self wanted, not what my husband wanted, not what my parents wanted – but ME as I am today.   Through many trials I finally figured out how to determine what I wanted, what could be pushed onto the back burner and ultimately how to manage it all.  What made it all work for me?  I worked out my top five values, wrote my vision and mission statement and continually reviewed where I was out of line with those things.  Suddenly decisions were easy – I just had to re-read them and I knew what was needed.

So what is my first advice to any struggling professional – determine what the most important values are to YOU in your life.
Then start taking steps to focus on those values.

Need help with determining your values? Download your values assesment at:
http://www.smartstepomaha.com