The Art of Listening to Myself
What I really want to talk with you about is Self Talk. But before we can become a master of our Self Talk we need to learn the Art of Listening. Here’s why. We have 50 – 60,0000 thoughts a day. Add to that the fact that 80% of our mind/thinking is below the conscious level. This means there’s a whole lot of stuff going on inside our minds and saying stuff of which we not aware.
Should we be paying attention? Does this matter? Oh yeah, it definitely it does. What are the thoughts running the show on those days where you feel less than your best, or you are stressed and there is that constant energy of low-level anxiety running just below the surface. Or how about when something good is going on, and you wonder when the other shoe is going to drop? We’ve been like this all of our lives, so we tell ourselves it’s normal – just part of life. But does it have to be? Is this the life we want? Or, is maybe now our time to deserve to have it better?
What if we started listening to our thoughts?
Our brains are wired to react automatically in the same way we’ve reacted since childhood – remember, everything that we hear and have experienced in our life is stored in our long-term memory. Until we become conscious about what we are feeling and thinking, how do we know to make a different choice – to give ourselves a different message?
What’s the level of consciousness of what you’re telling yourself amidst these 60,000 thoughts in a day?
Lately, I’ve been writing and talking a lot about feeling good. I do believe there’s nothing much more important than feeling good from a place of authenticity. If we started listening in to the thoughts in our mind might we not make some changes in what we are telling ourselves and feel even better?
Let’s step it up & take it to a higher level
I propose that we are capable of rising to a state of feeling blissful and happy in every moment. How do we do this?
Develop and Practice the Art of Feeling & Listening
Am I living in this state? Not yet. I am aware that it is possible, and I am painfully familiar with what keeps me from being there. And, I am even more convinced that I have barely begun to scale the heights of feeling good.
It hit me in the face this week after I had the opportunity to do an interview for Hay House Internet Radio. My initial thoughts were that it went quite well. A couple of hours later I started not feeling so good. “What’s going on?” I thought. Then I started listening in to a conversation going on in my mind.
Would you believe I was talking “smack” to myself?! I heard stuff like, “You should have said this. Why didn’t you say that? You weren’t any good. Hay House isn’t going to like you or ever want to publish you.” This all felt pretty awful, and I realized I’ve been talking “smack” like this to myself since I was a little girl. It felt like reject yourself before they reject you. Then their disapproval won’t hurt so much.
Now I understand why the little girl did this since disapproval was handed out to her pretty freely. But, this habit is not appropriate behavior in my life today. Once I heard it I knew it needed to be cleansed from my consciousness — immediately. It occurred to me to ask, “am I good enough for God? As a child, I didn’t believe I was, but this grown up girl definitely knows she is. It wasn’t God judging me – it was me and my fear of other humans judging me. I guess you could say I was putting other people into the position of God. When I put it that way it sounded insane.
I had to listen in and become aware of what I was telling myself. Only then was I able to know I was telling lies to myself, which made it possible to change my Self-talk.
When we start practicing the art of listening in on our mind’s conversations, I know we will all discover we have stories like this running in our minds. We are judging something about ourselves or saying something negative about what’s happening in the moment – telling ourselves we should be different, life should be different.
On my website, Who’sPullingMyStrings.com, you’ll find these words on the home page. They are also the last line in the book:
I have a dream of a world where all people love and accept themselves and each other –
where there are no more puppets, and we are all free at last to live our lives with no strings attached.
Imagine it. Really – just take a few moments and imagine how it feels to love and accept yourself and life – free of any judgement. Free of any thoughts we should be different – that life should be different. To be able to do this regardless of what’s happening in any given moment. This is taking feeling good to the next level. I know this is possible.
This is my new Self-Talk:
“I really love my life.”
“I like me, and I love the person I am.”
I’m sharing these words because they seem to be a powerful way to shift my energy and thoughts. If I’m already feeling good they make me feel even better, and if not so good – the negative thoughts flee immediately. Maybe you’ll find it good for you too. Give it a try.