The Art of Talking To Yourself » Why It Does Not Always Mean You Are Crazy

I maybe having the first sign of madness, but talking to myself actually help me in making sound decisions. Yes, I may sound crazy, but this is not a statement of paranormal; it is a statement of truth. We all have an inner voice…and I consider mine as an ally.

Most of the time I am telling myself things I would never let anyone else say to me. This way I am not letting my inner voice tear down and strip away my confidence. This is the beauty of self-talk and I think I am not crazy. Self-talk is not bad, or wrong, or a sign of psychological problems. It is, I think, normal. Here’s a quick research I did on this topic.

What the hell is self talk?

In psychological terms, the talking is referred to as self-talk (wow, not a very complicated term, eh?). It’s also known as verbal persuasion, an important component of self-efficacy conceptualized by psychologist Albert Bandura presented in his social cognitive theory. Self-talk is a way of describing all the things we say to ourselves all day long as we confront obstacles, make decisions, and resolve problems. Self-talk is not "talking to yourself" in a literal sense, although it sometimes does involve talking out loud (I know a lot of person who do that – thinking out loud as they say.)

Why talking to yourself does not always mean you are crazy

Yodz talking, shouting, cursing....TO HIMSELF

 Usually, it is part of our thinking process, or what we call "stream of consciousness." As we are presented with problems, or decisions, we might think, "Okay, how do I handle this?' or "This looks like it is difficult, I better ask for help." or "I know how to fix this!" Self Talk is how you talk to yourself through out the day. It may be comprised of either positive or negative statements.

As a general rule, negative self talk is anything that puts us down or limits our actions, on the other hand positive self talk makes us feel good or motivates our actions. Positive self talk is extremely beneficial and will enhance the effects of future programming techniques. Once mastered, it will result in an attitude that anything is possible.

It is not madness, and it’s good for you, say scientists

Okay, Sir Yodz this is how we will handle this...

There has been a wealth of research in psychology that supports the advantages and usefulness of self-talk, especially when combined with other peak performance strategies. It is not madness, and it’s good for you, scientists have found.

According to researchers, it can even strengthen dieters’ willpower, help defuse arguments and improve decision-making.

Psychologists from the University of Toronto in Canada asked volunteers to complete several challenges to test their self-control. In some, they were prevented from talking to themselves by being forced to recite one word repeatedly.

Researcher Professor Michael Inzlicht said: "Through a series of tests, we found that people acted more impulsively when they couldn’t use their inner voice or talk themselves through the tasks."

In one challenge, the volunteers performed a test on a computer. If they saw a particular symbol appear on the screen, they were told to press a button.

If they saw a different symbol, they were told they must refrain from pushing the button. The majority of the symbols required the volunteers to press the button, making this become an impulsive response.

Their self-control could be measured by how well they resisted pressing it when an alternative symbol did appear. The second phase of the study included measures to prevent participants from exercising their inner voice while performing the tests, to see whether blocking this dialogue had any effect on their powers of restraint.

In order to stop the volunteers talking to themselves, they were instructed to repeat one word over and over as they performed each test.

Professor Inzlicht said: “Without being able to verbalise messages to themselves, they were not able to exercise the same amount of self-control as when they could talk themselves through the process. It’s always been known that people have internal dialogues with themselves, but until now, we’ve never known what an important function they serve. This study shows that talking to ourselves in this “inner voice” actually helps us exercise self control and prevents us from making impulsive decisions.”

Alexa Tullett, author of the study, added: “We give ourselves messages all the time with the intent of controlling ourselves – whether that’s telling ourselves to keep running when we’re tired, to stop eating even though we want one more slice of cake, or to refrain from blowing up on someone in an argument. We wanted to find out whether talking to ourselves in this “inner voice” actually helps.”

The team’s research has been published in the science journal Acta Psychologica.

CAUTION: Talk to yourself instead of allowing “yourself” talk to you

According to David Martyn Lloyd-Jones, author of the book Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cure, it is important that we must talk to ourselves, instead of allowing “ourselves” to talk to us. He suggested that the main trouble in this whole matter of depression in a sense is that we allow our self to talk to us instead of talking to our self. He further stressed that most of our unhappiness in life is due to the fact that we are listening to ourselves instead of talking to ourselves.

Be good at being yourself

We can now safely conclude that outward success first starts with inward success. The trick is we have to learn the secret strategies to winning communication with ourselves. Everyday we talk to ourselves and about ourselves.

We affirm our beliefs, explain our behaviour, and predict our future. We persuade, cajole, order and suggest stuff constantly and consistently. For this reason alone we can be very good at being the person we really want to be.

The lesson? Learn self talk the right way -- it's a valuable performance tool.

At the very least, I tell myself that.

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Photo Credit:

» Yodz Doube Trouble by Aldan Reposo January 2011
» Talk to the hand by cold-wind-of-death [Retrieved 28 January 2011] {http://cold-wind-of-death.deviantart.com/art) Category: Digital Art / Photomanipulation / Surreal

References: 

» Bandura, A. (1992) Exercise of personal agency through the self-efficacy mechanisms. In R. Schwarzer (Ed.), Self-efficacy: Thought control of action. Washington, DC: Hemisphere.

» Franklin, Donald J., Ph.D., “Self-talk”. Psychology Information Online

http://www.psychologyinfo.com/depression/cognitive.htm [28 January 2011]

» Daily Mail Reporter. “Is talking to yourself a sign of madness? No it's good for you, say scientists” 23rd September 2010 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1314434/Is-talking-sign-madness-No-good-say-scientists.html [28 January 2011]

» University of Toronto. "Inner voice plays role in self control." ScienceDaily 22 September 2010. 31 January 2011 .
» Tullett, Alexa. The voice of self-control: Blocking the inner voice increases impulsive responding. Acta Psychologica, 2010
» Lloyd-Jones, David Martyn, 1965. Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cure. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans

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Nocturnal Wisdom » Thou shall not sleep at seven in the evening

I don’t know if it it’s worth writing what I have to say, because basically I am talking to a half-sleep idiot – which is myself. But I’ll say it for the two or three of you who are not. 

I only got three hours sleep last night because of watching that damn TV series “The Legend of the Seeker” which, by the way, lacks depth. After watching a few episodes I find it has a very common story plot – but I’m still planning to finish season one, and even bought season two DVD. Isn’t it idiotic? Well, still nothing beats Heroes, Lost and Prison Break.

Nocturnal wisdom

But I digress, I force myself to wake up early for work – sleepy and edgy the whole day, drink a bottle of beer at 6:00 p.m. while waiting for the heavy rain to get heavier. I felt really tired and wish that a lightning would perhaps strike that nearby tree or the radio antenna of the adjacent Paragon building – you know, just to break the damn monotony of this damn Monday. Karen Carpenter is right – rainy days and Mondays always get me down.

Expecting nothing unusual will happen today, I decided to go home and violate the bachelor’s unwritten commandment – Thou shall not sleep as early as seven in the evening. 

The annoying thing is that I wake up before midnight having these random thoughts about life. I cannot force myself to get back to sleep so I grab my laptop and decided to write my random midnight rants. 

Here’s  my self-help nocturnal wisdom:

Opportunity is not a talking peacock

I repeatedly ignore opportunity so maybe it loses its interest in me too. I now realize that opportunity is like a bird suddenly showing itself one sultry afternoon at the veranda. Because I thought it is just a common bird I see everyday, I immediately lose interest and turn my back on it. Then it spread its wings as it flew away, showing its bright and rare color hiding underneath – but of course, I missed it, because I’m impatient and turned my back on it. If I look a little longer and waited, I might saw it and be able to grab it. I beg to disagree to those who are saying that opportunities are rare; it is actually presenting itself to us everyday, the problem is how we look at it. It’s not always appearing as the flamboyant-talking peacock saying “Hey moron! I am opportunity, would you like to grab me?”

I always leave self-discipline on my pillow when I wake up

I always buy a Stradmore organizer at the start of every year. Written on the first few pages of it are the things I accomplished the previous year and what I intend to accomplish for the coming year. For the past three years I realized that I haven’t fully accomplished what I set three years ago – because I lack self-discipline. I always start a plan or project with fiery enthusiasm for a few months, only to be neglected and abandoned without any solid result. I can’t imagine what I could have accomplished if I could simply get myself to follow through on my best plans and intentions no matter what and if only I could always carry with me the art of self-discipline. 

Next time, don’t leave discipline on the pillow you bastard!

I guess I need a round of LATIGO whipping

I heard the military are the best teachers of discipline – so maybe educational institutions should include in their curriculum a one month stay in a military academy to learn about discipline? But of course, in any school even in military, they don’t actually teach the important life lessons; like discipline, attitude, and life in general. You have to learn it in the real world, in actual interaction with others and oftentimes learning it all by yourself.

So here I am, in the middle of the night, writing this nonsense and feeling stagnant.  I’ve written a number of blog post about discipline and I know I’m sounding like a crazy cricket here, repeatedly screaming meaningless and annoying noise in the middle of the night.  I guess what I need now is a round of whipping with a latigo – yes, that old trick of gaining self-discipline over our behaviors with the latigo (Filipino term for a whip).

However, self-flagellation with a latigo is a crazy 14th century practice of those obsessed Opus Dei members. Hence, I just make an acronym for LATIGO to make a convenient way to remember self-discipline.

What? An acronym for LATIGO? Yeah I know you’re probably thinking of those corny Filipino acronyms like I.T.A.L.Y. (I Trust And Love You) – I can’t believe they even make it a movie title, or C.H.I.N.A. (Come Here I Need Affection) or the worst - P.H.I.L.I.P.P.I.N.E.S. (Pumping Hot.. I Love It! Please Please.. I Need Erotic Stimulation!)

All right, all right let’s stop it. Here’s my acronym for L.A.T.I.G.O. (Lifelong Attitude Towards Initiating Goals Outstandingly)

See? I just gave my own definition of self-discipline meaning:

SELF-DISCIPLINE = LATIGO (Lifelong Attitude Towards Initiating Goals Outstandingly) 
{Applause! Applause!}
 
Ok, I’m not yet sleepy but I’ll stop this nonsense. Maybe a few pages of Umberto Eco’s Turning back the Clock and a glass of warm milk will help me get back to sleep.

…Oh shit, the milk carton is empty.

I didn’t expect comments but if you would like to drop one, I’ll appreciate it. Goodnight and Good morning folks!