How to overcome negative self-talk: Name it. Thank it. Tame it.

I recently saw a video that Sharon Salzberg produced on How Mindfulness Empowers Us. She shares a Native American folktale, about two wolves. An elder says to a child, “I have two wolves fighting in my heart. One wolf is fearful, vengeful and angry, and the other is compassionate, kind and gentle." The child asks, “which wolf will win the fight?” And the elder responds, "The one I feed.”

The powerful message intended in this story is the fact that you choose how you want to respond, behave, and engage with others. No one makes you feel a certain way; you decide what voices you listen to, how you feel, and how you want to respond to the world around you. However, there was something that didn’t sit well with me. The way the “bad wolf” was dismissed didn’t seem to be the right approach.
 
From my experience working with many executives, I’m well aware of the impact negative self-talk. When you continue to pay attention to the negative voice in you head, it grows and becomes more destructive. As my colleague Anne Suh says, “What we practice grows stronger.”
 
And, I have found the reverse to be true as well. The more you try to ignore the negative talk or “gremlin” (as it’s often called), the more it grows and the louder it becomes. So, if you listen to the gremlin, it grows and if you ignore it, it continues to grow as well…. what is one supposed to do? 
 
Here’s a strategy that helps many of my clients deal with their gremlins: Name it. Thank it. Tame It.

1. NAME IT: The first step is to simply notice the gremlin (without criticism). Recognize when that negative voice appears. If you can, give it a shape, a color, a personality. The sillier it is the better. If this image can bring a smile to your face (rather than a fear response) you’re well on your way! Once it has a shape and personality, go ahead and name it. Again, the sillier, the better. And, don’t worry, this is all happening in your own head, you don’t have to share this with anyone else.
2. THANK IT: This may seem extremely counter-intuitive. Why would I want to thank my gremlin? Many times, this negative talk was created (by you) to keep you safe. Keep you safe?? Yes. Let’s say you tried to speak up in class in elementary school and you made a comment that was totally off-base and everyone in the class started laughing at you. Well, your brain remembers that moment and has documented that experience as a threat to your system. So, anytime now (40+ years later) that you want to speak up in a meeting, you have a voice saying, “Don’t say it, you’ll look like a fool!” When you thank your gremlin, you learn to accept where this voice may have come from and then you choose to disagree with the voice. This is an important distinction. Accept and Disagree.
3. TAME IT: Last, your brain doesn’t have any time stamps. While you were living your life, maturing, gaining new experiences, and learning new concepts, your brain is operating in the present. Have you ever had an experience where you walked into a room and smelled something that triggered a thought of something from your past? Perhaps a memory of your grandmother’s house or maybe a smell that brought you back to a vacation spot you once visited? Your brain literally puts you back in that moment as if you are there now. This gremlin voice hasn’t grown up; he’s stuck in that moment. Our job then is to tame and mentor our gremlin. I like to imagine myself locking arms side by side with the gremlin and saying, “I hear you and I’ve got it from here. Watch and learn.” And, then I step in to control the situation and choose a more mature, rational action.

  
What I like about this approach is that I’m not trying to suppress the negative thoughts, I recognize, accept, and move on. The more you practice this technique the more you become in charge.  
 
During our last Book Club discussion on the book, “You are Not Your Brain,” we explored the way author Jeffrey Schwartz differentiates between the mind and the brain. He explains in the book, the “brain decides what will grab you [and the] mind can decide what to do when grabbed.” Schwartz came up with a concept of “Free Won’t” instead of Free Will. In his research, he has documented that there is a half of a second from the time your brain decides to take an action to the time your mind is conscious of that thought. And then there is another half of a second before your pre-frontal cortex (higher brain functioning) kicks in. Although this may sound daunting of how quickly you react from a thought or stimulus, the good news is that if you simply take two deep breaths before reacting, you can buy yourself some time to react in a more rational manner.
 
Victor Frankl, a psychologist and Holocaust survivor is often quoted to have said, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” He proclaims that even in the midst of the most horrifying human conditions (referring to the concentration camps), “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
 
So, I challenge you, next time you become aware of your gremlin telling you you’re not good enough, smart enough, (fill in the blank) enough… first take a breath and then get to know this little voice. Name it, Thank it, Tame it. 

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