You’re not good enough. You’ve gained so much weight. You can’t do it. You’re not lovable. What is wrong with you? Are these things you would ever say to your friend? Family member? Partner? Child? When they’re having a moment of self-doubt and confiding in you, would any of these phrases come to mind to help console them? If your answer to any of those was yes, you may have some serious self-evaluating to do, and are probably not the audience I’m looking for, please exit now. If your answer was absolutely not, and I would have a lot to say if I ever heard anyone talk to my loved one like that! Then my next question to you is why do you allow yourself to have these thoughts about you? No judgement, just an honest question.
Trust me when I say, you are not alone in this matter. I have been a firsthand expert of negative self-talk for the past thirty-seven years. I am just now finally realizing how detrimental it is and deciding to do something about it. But how you speak to yourself truly does matter. It sets the tone for how others treat you. It gives you boundaries on what you will tolerate. The good thing about it is you have the control to change it at any moment, at any age, at any time in your life. It doesn’t matter where you are. You can make the choice to change it.
The Dread of a New Day
It wasn’t very long ago I would wake up and every single morning, my first thought was always a negative one, usually some kind of small hatred with myself as the target. I would literally open my eyes and have an instant pang of anxiety. Granted, I was probably going through some form of depression for a long while, never seeking guidance or help, just hoping it would eventually pass. But like clockwork, this was how I started my day. It could be anything from I don’t want to do this again today (meaning the day in general and living it), to it’s never going to get any better, or my personal favorite why should I even try, it’s pointless. Along with how you speak to yourself, how you start your day is equally important. It is the stepping stone for how the rest of your day will progress and at that time in my life, I was having more bad/sad days than good ones. Sometimes, writing these blogs can be therapeutic. Other times, it makes me really sad for that version of myself. The one who thought so little of herself. The one who didn’t have any hope. My heart aches for her anytime I think back on this time because she deserved more of me. I’m proud that I eventually decided to show up for her and make some changes. It wasn’t easy, but it was definitely worth it.
This is something I’ve been working on and off on for the last few years, giving up before any real progress could be made. I would gain a speck of hope from somewhere, go about trying to change habits, continue doing so for a little while, see no progress and give up. Sometimes, I would even see some small progress, psyche myself out thinking it was too much work and effort. I convinced myself that the risk was not worth the reward. I now realize that was just my laziness and fear taking over. It wasn’t until I got shoved on my ass, hospitalized for a stroke, and out of work for three months did I think okay something really has to change this time.
I talk a lot on here about how my stroke made me want to become a better version of myself and actually put in an effort to do so. It was a turning point in my life, a blessing in disguise. I was in a dark place for many years before I had my stroke. It gave me courage to be brave, even though I was afraid because it showed me, I was capable of doing so. I’ve seen more progress in myself over the last five months than I have in the last five years. I truly believe it’s in large part because I learned how to start speaking to myself lovingly.
No Judgement Zone
It didn’t happen all at once. Honestly, it was really frustrating and hard to even start the process. Where do I begin? I started to meditate again. I had done some meditating here and there in the past, and I knew it was helpful when I used it properly. A lot of times, when I was meditating on my own, I wasn’t really invested in it. I just did it to cross it off my to do list, give myself a little ego boost like I was doing something good for myself, and then move about my day. It wasn’t until I started meditating with intention (major key) that I could see the benefits it has to offer. I would recommend meditating to just about anyone. It’s a very eye-opening experience. You sit quietly, concentrating on your breath, and just watch your thoughts pass, without trying to cling to one thought and without judgment. What I noticed is that my mind was pretty nonstop, focusing on things that were either out of my control or weren’t all that important, and I would fixate on certain thoughts, usually the worst thoughts. It took me a long time to realize that just because I was thinking it didn’t make it true.
After paying attention to the types of thoughts that were crossing my mind for a while, I decided to take it up a notch. Whenever I noticed a negative thought come up, I would acknowledge it and ask myself is this thought true. If the answer was yes, I would ask further questions: Is this something I can control? What can I do to change it? How can I turn this negative thought into a positive one? Once I hit a no answer, I let the thought go. I wouldn’t allow myself to ruminate and dive deeper into the thought. For example, I could have the thought: I don’t like the way I look. It was true at the time and something I could control. There was a lot I could do about it. I could stop smoking, make sure to do my skincare routine every day, stick to my workouts, and clean up my diet a little bit. I could change the thought to I don’t love everything about my appearance, but I’m working on appreciating myself more. Another example is: he doesn’t love me the way I want him to. Is this true? Maybe. Can I control this? No. I would immediately let the thought go and let myself be free of the stress and anxiety the thought caused. This definitely took some practice. A lot of the time, the same negative thought would creep its way back up. Over and over again, I would have to do the same process for the same thought. Retraining your brain takes a lot of work and patience. It wants to go back to its comfort zone; it doesn’t want to do the work of retraining the way you think. YOU have to fight against the urge to crawl back into comfort and practice the step one more time.
Sometimes, it wasn’t even a thought I had necessarily. It was more of a fear that that’s what I thought other people might be thinking of me. I had a lot of anxiety problems, okay? And I think that other people may relate to that statement. My anxiety level in these moments was clearly at an all-time high. I let the fear of the possibility of others judging me cloud the judgement I had for myself. Maybe they were thoughts I secretly had about myself that I passed off onto others because I was scared. Either way, the what ifs and could bes will drive you crazy if you let it. Don’t let it. Focus on what you can control, change the things you can, and accept the things you can’t. Everything else if just background noise. It’s irrelevant.
The Truth Hurts, So Does Staying Still.
It took a long time for me to realize and accept that I was the cause of a lot of my sadness. The way I thought about myself and spoke to myself was honestly disgusting. Of course I was depressed, I was treating myself like shit. The truth hurts a lot of the time. When you make the choice to heal and/or change, the process isn’t always rainbows and unicorns. A lot of times, it’s looking yourself dead in the eyes, and admitting your faults and where you fell short. Which is why a lot of people make the choice not to do anything about it. They decide that comfort is easier than dealing with the realness of things. Choose your hard.
One day, after months of hard work and acknowledging thoughts patterns, you’ll start to notice subtle changes. Maybe you’re looking in the mirror at the gym before you start a set, and at one point you would’ve thought I can’t do this. It’s too hard, but instead, you tell yourself “I got this. This is light weight.” Or you’re sitting in the parking lot before your shift starts and instead of you absolutely dreading the twelve hours in front of you, you have a little spark of excitement and you realize it’s a privilege to be in your position to help people the way you do. It’s noticing those small things that should push you to keep going and wonder how far can I take this? It starts with your foundation, though. Be kinder to yourself. Watch your confidence build from that and everything else will start to fall into place.
The proof is in the rewrite. Here’s to redefining priorities, embracing life, and healing out loud.
Xo-J.
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