“The
key to happiness - or that even more desired thing, calmness - lies not in
always thinking happy thoughts. No. That is impossible. No mind on earth with
any kind of intelligence could spend a lifetime enjoying only happy thoughts.
The key is in accepting your thoughts, all of them, even the bad ones. Accept
thoughts, but don't become them.
Understand, for instance, that having a sad thought, even having a continual
succession of sad thoughts, is not the same as being a sad person.” ― Reasons to Stay Alive
Once we were cave women and needed negative self-talk to keep us safe from cave bears and keep us safe. Today, negative self-talk gives us nothing but emotional distress, soul distress, and we self-sabotage. Today, we correct ourselves with cultural bias in that we critic ourselves, with Ego and that Critical Inner voice (evil inner witch) that only applauds and voices its opinion according to the beliefs and values of our culture, where it suits our soul or not. If we listen to that Evil Inner witch, as I call that critical inner voice, we begin to experience woundedness in body, mind, heart and soul. We can become pessimistic and see challenging things as difficult things. We can begin to feel weary instead of empowered. We can feel annoyed rather than simply see things as inconvenient. We forget that we are lifelong learners with the I-do-not-know therefore I-am-not-good-enough. We say we “can’t” rather than I-can-try. Yet. We forget to add the “yet”. Maybe it is time to do some housecleaning of the language of our psyche. Re-Frame.
When we catch ourselves with the negative self-talk, we need to listen to it and re-label those thoughts for what they are. We need to see if that self-talk is giving us relief or pleasure for the Ego/Evil Inner witch and are on our way to acting/reacting due to the anxiety that the amygdala is inviting. We need to think about the WHY of feelings and call them for what they are. (Usually anxiety that is Ego-driven.) Name the feeling for what it really is and it dissipates. Re-Label.
When you feel negative thoughts starting to happen, check the importance. Check the accuracy. The Critical Inner voice loves to exaggerate. Don’t try to deny the feelings. They are valid in their own skewed way. Think on them. Get them sorted and then go do something wonderful for your bravery and fortitude. Re-Focus.
Because the Critical Inner Voice is not authentic, not based on reality of you, those negative thoughts can absolutely be shuffled off. Discern the difference between that false voice (fake news) and your soul. There is a still small voice no matter how long it has been since you actually listened for and to it. It is the voice of value. Re-Value.
No matter what anyone says to us, we have to remember, even in our darkest moments or hours or days, that we have the DNA of our first maternal ancestor. We are directly connected by being flesh of her flesh. That is a Divine connection. Be that and don’t let anyone or anything tell you otherwise.
©Carol Desjarlais 5.28.22
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