This is such a wide and important topic! And today, we are focussing on one key element – how negative self-talk is inherent in the creation of ‘depression’ and what you can do straight away to begin to turn that around, while debunking a major myth in the process. Even if ‘depression’ is not something you identify with, and you just want to create more of the good stuff, keep on reading!
**NB: when I reference the word ‘depression’ today I’m talking about mild, episodic, temporary periods of depression, and not persistent, severe or what may be termed a ‘clinical’ depression. If you have these issues, this may help you, but your spectrum of treatment obviously needs to be considerably broader. Please consult a professional if in any doubt.**
Martin Seligman, the founder of Positive Psychology teaches us two very important concepts. Firstly, we used to believe that negative and critical inner dialogue (self-talk) was a symptom of a depressive state. We now know and understand that instead it is one of the key causes of it. And this makes perfect sense in the understanding a simple equation – talk to yourself like crap, judge and criticise yourself, and you’re going to feel bad. It’s not possible to talk to yourself in this way and feel good at the same time. Your brain can’t do this.
Secondly, the solution to this is NOT blind optimism, or Pollyanna Positive / rose tinted glasses kind of thinking. In fact, from his analysis he found that this kind of thinking no more served us in our lives then the really negative stuff did. People who thought this optimistically were not equipped to deal with life’s inevitable adversity when it arose, and they were therefore unable to build useful resilience in response to such events. Listen to his definition of learned optimism (vs pessimism) here.
Michael Yapkow, an expert in the fast reversal of depression using brief therapy, has found something similar to be the case, which he teaches to his patients: it’s not that happy people go around giving themselves high-fives every day for tying their shoe laces, or look at themselves in the mirror and say “you’re SO awesome!”. No. In fact, people who are living happily rather than depressed still have their negative dialogue, it’s just they have learned not to listen to it any more or take it seriously.
I teach this in much more depth in my upcoming online training, because this understanding helped me form one of the key principles of developing a useful and healthy Inner Coach practice. If we don’t want extreme optimism and high-fives, then what is it we are going for when developing an Inner Coach, that’s actually useful to us? This is all explained.
For now, imagine you had a volume control on that Inner Critic, as if it were a bad radio station you were tuned into. Try imagining you could simply turn it down, so you don’t have to listen to it all the time. Now, what’s that like?
Any questions or feedback, give me a shout. I’d genuinely love to hear form you.
Warmly, Charlotte.