We all have that one voice, that voice in our head that is our constant companion. For some of us, we may be lucky and that voice is kind, compassionate and forgiving. However, I fear that for the vast majority of us, this voice is a constant critic, a nagging companion that reminds us of our past failures and shortfalls. The voice is always there to foresee the worst case scenario, reminding us of the potential catastrophe that awaits us at every turn in life.
So what can we do to control this inner chatter? Can it be controlled? What steps can we take to make sure that our inner voice is a little more friendly and supportive than at present? How can we make friends with our inner critic?
Awareness of our triggers.
If we are to gain some element of control over our inner chatter, we need to go through the following steps:
Understand the chatter. We have different forms of chatter based on different times in our lives. We ruminate about the past, thinking on how things could have been so different if we had somehow made better choices. We worry about the future, building concern for things that have not yet happened.
Our chatter is made up of the past and the future- neither of which we can change or control.
We live in the present, with the only thing that we can really control being our emotional response to what life throws at us.
Recognise the clear steps that we can take to control the chatter and our associated emotions within.
Familiarise ourselves with the tools that can help us to moderate our inner chatter.
Experiment with those tools to see which work for us in what situations. When dealing with the inner critic, one size definitely does not fit all and there is no miracle solution to switching the mind on or off. We have to find what works best for us.
Why do we have an inner voice?
Our brain has developed over millions of years to be a truly remarkable organ. It keeps us safe and can help us adapt to our ever changing environment.
Our inner voice is not all bad. We use our inner voice to remember things- how many times have you been into a shop rehearsing a list in your head of what you need to remember? This is our inner voice friend helping us out. We use our inner voice to simulate and plan future ventures and tasks- how many of us before an important interview role play our answers in our heads before we step into the interview? We use our inner voice to control, coach and motivate ourselves- in the gym we mentally count down the reps to go when things get tough, we have mental cues that we tell ourselves prior to a big lift.
In summary, our inner voice is not all bad- it helps us to understand life and make sense of the situations that we find ourselves in. It can be our greatest ally and for a good number of reasons we wouldn’t want to face life without it. However, it is a powerful beast, and when the chatter runs out of control it can often cause more harm than good. Remember:
Bad is stronger than good
Our brain has developed over a period of evolution to have a greater focus on the threats rather than the nicer things in life- it is the key to us surviving and being in existence today. Evolutionary, it was more important for us to focus on the sabre-toothed tiger than the beautiful sunrise that warmed our soul.
This survival negativity bias has remained within our brains operating procedure to this day. Our brain will always focus on potential losses or threats before looking for any potential gains- it is simple evolution. We cannot change this bias or re-wire our brains against it, but we can use techniques to help us mitigate against the debilitating effects of the bias.
Can we silence our inner critic?
In a word- no.
We have no responsibility or control over the thoughts that enter our head- they just happen. If we examine the origin of our inner voice, it is designed to keep us safe. It will inevitably invoke a physical stress response, which in survival situations is beneficial. We need a degree of stress in our lives in order to respond to threats and survive. Our inner voice only gets toxic when the body is exposed to these stress responses over an extended period of time. We need to find some way to moderate our inner chatter to limit this extended exposure to chronic stress responses within the body.
Although we cannot silence our inner voice, we can control how we engage with each active thought as it arises. We can apply a range of different strategies that allow us to distance ourselves from those thoughts, and respond rationally to the emotions they evoke.
Tools to provide distance from our inner voice
Mindfulness is often touted as the great solution to quietening our inner chatter, but in reality, it is just one of many tools at our disposal. There is a common misconception that we need to live out lives entirely in the present if we are to be truly mindful. This is not the case, as even the most proficient meditative gurus drift out of the moment for all the right reasons.
It is good to allow our inner voice to think back and reflect, happy thoughts give us resilience for when times are hard and dreams of the future are a powerful motivator. Our mind is a wonderful, sophisticated beast that is designed to let us travel through time in an instant. Just because we are occasionally irritated with our inner chatter does not mean that we should throw the baby out with the bath water and discard that amazingly powerful potential.
Speaking to our selves in 3rd person. Ask yourself the question, how would you advise a friend about a situation that you face? Offer yourself some encouragement:
Come on Rich, you can do this!
By speaking to yourself in this way, you are causing your brain to start thinking of others, which is naturally more empathetic than our self talk.
Nearly there, you have 2 more reps to go.
You are doing really well.
As humans we are often guilty of the Salomon paradox- where we are better at giving advice to others than giving the same advice to ourselves.
Friend orientated advice to self- thinking how you would speak to a friend in the same situation causes an immediate change our brain within a second of contemplating the thought. It immediately changes our mindset to be more positive. We have clear social norms when talking to others- what is acceptable and more importantly, what is unacceptable. We have no such norms for speaking to ourselves via our inner voice. The hidden words we direct to ourselves in our heads are completely unsolicited and uncensored. If we verbalised these words out loud, we would be considered insane!
One of Jordan Peterson’s main rules for life is treat yourself like someone you are responsible for.
Tough coach. Not withstanding the above point about being your new best friend, we also have to be realistic and accept that as humans we are inherently lazy and will always be tempted by the course of least resistance. To survive as humans, it was an evolutionary advantage to conserve energy in times when we weren’t hunting or gathering. This evolutionary bias towards laziness remains today, so at times we need our inner voice to jump start us into action just like a tough coach would. There is nothing wrong with this approach- at times we need to take the advice from our coach.
Temporal distancing. Put in place some time distance between the event and your emotional response. How will you feel about the problem the next day, the next week or in 6 months time? How many times in the past have we worried and then a short time later could not actually recall what we were worrying about? This tool can be particularly useful in the middle of the night when our inner critic can be most vocal. Preplanning for moments like this can be really beneficial.
Visual distancing. How would others see this problem? By looking at a situation through others’ eyes can really help provide some additional distance and perspective on any given problem. Our inner critic may want to make something really important to us in the moment, but others may see it very differently.
Journaling. Regular journaling provides us with the reflective space to distance ourselves from a problem and puts us in a position of an external observer to the problem, rather than being an integral participant in the problem.
Talking to others. As long as we are clear in the type of conversation we engage in, we can provide some distance from our inner critic by talking to others. We have two main needs from a supportive conversation. We need to be able to care for our social and emotional needs at the same time as meeting our cognitive needs about a particular problem.
We can use the conversation to vent about an issue- effectively rehashing the information and unloading our emotions, which can be helpful in meeting out social and emotional needs.
At the same time, we can use conversation as a tool to broaden our horizons on a problem and provide a cognitive shift in our understanding.
If we are providing this conversational support to others we need to carefully balance the importance of listening (allowing the vent), with coaching advice (asking questions to promote a cognitive shift in thinking).
Experiencing awe. Awe provides distance through us gaining a more realistic perspective of life. It effectively shrinks our view of ourselves. When we feel smaller in the grand scheme of the universe, our inner chatter naturally feel smaller and more insignificant. Awe and ultimately perspective can be found in nature by getting out in the great outdoors. It can be when we observe something truly remarkable such as an amazing human performance, or reflect on the vastness of the universe simply by looking up at the night sky.
Emergency quick wins when inner chatter is going crazy
Rituals. Rituals provide order and order diminishes our tendency for inner chatter. When the going and the chatter gets tough, go back to the rituals that you have developed over time. We all know of famous sporting stars that rely on their rituals in times of pressure, so why don’t we do the same? Getting up at the same time, keeping a set morning routine and going to bed at a set time are all easily controllable routines that we can rely on.
Creating order. If in doubt tidy up. An ordered environment means an ordered mind which occupies our inner chatter. When our thoughts are racing, we are in a place of chaos. To counteract chaos we need order in our lives- any sort of order will do. This concept of compensatory control is beautiful summarised by Jordan Peterson as just… tidy your god dam room.
Exposure to nature… or any green space (that is safe) can have an immediate effect in an emergency. Nature carefully and gently draws our attention away from our inner chatter by offering us a varied stimuli to focus upon instead. Very little in nature is ordered or linear- nature has its own patterns that are irregular and unique- offering us a real restorative influence on the brain. We need an alternative stimuli to focus our attention on rather than out inner chatter.
Will we ever fully control our inner voice?
Probably not, and if you have read up to this point you will understand that it is for good reason. Our inner voice only becomes a problem when it is overly critical and that negativity becomes chronic and sustained over time. On many occasions in life, our inner voice is one of our most valuable assets.
However, if you are struggling with your inner voice, rest assured you are not alone. Everyone struggles at times, we just need have the resilience, understanding and skills to just give it another go, and not give in.
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