Do You Talk to Yourself?

[donsnow]

I've been talking to myself since 1965. Well, counting my journal, since 1958. It wasn't until 1990 that I learned there was a right and wrong way to talk to myself.

I used to cuss myself out, call myself stupid and other such terms.

Well, you see, self listens. It turned out, until 1990, I caused myself a lot of trouble, the way I talked to me.

Now, God gave me the gift of gab (it's called that in Ireland). It's not speaking in tongues, which is speaking in different languages. It's a verbal nature, to my character. My parents added to it, by allowing no cussing at home. My mother never cussed, and I only heard my USAF father cuss one time in all my life with him. The books I read early on until I was a young man, had no cussing in them. For over half my life, the movies and music I heard had no profanity...it was a clean world and a real world. So, I got off to a good verbal start.

However, by H.S., I had developed a sarcastic streak, which could scathe another person worse than profanity, obscenity, vulgarity and other such verbal abuse. I've been working on that, since 1990, too.

Back to "...self listens."; this means I had to learn to listen critically, to what I said, when I said it, before I could start working on my faults. That was around 1969. I was surprised, by what I heard myself saying. In learning to talk benefically to myself, I learned not to flatter myself, nor verbally abuse myself and to be truthful, for a lasting benefit.

I want to share the above with ya'll, so you can stop adding unnecessary grief to your lives. I rely on the Gospels as a good example of what to say to myself and others. The feedback is grand.

Would like input from ya'll, too, as I haven't learned everything to learn.

God loves all of us,
Don

[Curious]

Don that was an awesome post. What you describe sounds like the "self talk" which is talked about in psychological circles. You seemed to have taught yourself some negative self-talk, realized it was negative, and then learned to make it positive. That's pretty cool.

My self-talk seems very similar to yours. I, too, have a sarcastic nature, and sometimes I can really be cruel and cutting and mean to myself. These are times when we stop, examine those thoughts, and see if there's really any truth to them, or if we might can replace them with more positive thoughts - a concept of cognitive behavioral therapy.

A recent conversation I had with myself went something like this. I was feeling pretty ******:

This is it. I'm always going to feel this way. I've lost the battle. No matter how much I try and how much I cooperate, I'm going to lose. I'm going to be miserable. This is my destiny.

So I wallowed around in this for awhile and finally got ahold of myself and responded this way:

Really? NEVER going to feel better? Give me a break...this will pass. It always passes. God doesn't destine people for misery. You've felt better than this before and you will again...etc...etc...

See? It helped, even if only a little....

Curious

[Robert Sock]

Yeah, I have self-talk. Mostly positive suggestions.

[leeray]

Hello,
Nope, I don't talk to myself. I get bad 1970's or 1980's music and then I up the Seroquel
God Bless,
Leeray

[Curious]

Hey leeray,

I don't think Don meant do we talk to ourselves in crazy-hearing-voices-in-the-head kind of way. I believe he meant purposeful positive or negative self-talk that can have a direct impact on the way we feel. y'know?

Curious

[kimberly923200]

JMJ

Don,

I'm going to start that positive self-talk. I am way too hard on myself as a general rule. Thank you for the idea.

Blessings,
KImberly

[donsnow]

Hey, all -

I am humbled by and grateful for, each of your responses.

Self-talk, to my understanding, is anything you say to or think about, yourself.

I'm so glad to have been a help.

God loves us all,
Don

[forhim14]

Occasionally, however I do not see this as a form of mental illness in anyway