Talking to yourself: a very therapeutic practice

Talking to yourself out loud is a little crazy, as well as establishing an internal dialogue where sadness is broken down and worries diffused. What’s more, few practices are more therapeutic, because at the end of the day we all live with ourselves, and communicating with ourselves is something vital, something cathartic and emotionally necessary to care for ourselves as we deserve.

With great success, Aldous Huxley said that there is only a small part of the universe that we can know in depth and improve, and that part is ours, the one that belongs to us: ourselves. However, as curious as it may seem, we do not always give it the attention it deserves. We neglect ourselves like someone who leaves their personal diary in a drawer, like someone who leaves their house keys in other people’s pockets.

What’s more, as psychologists explain to us, all of us make use of internal dialogue; However, we do it in the worst possible way. For example, Ethan Kross, a well-known emotional psychology scientist at the University of Michigan, realized that The human being is hopelessly prone to negative self-talk.

He himself noticed it one morning while he was looking at his mobile phone. Without realizing it, he crossed a zebra crossing with a red light. After barely avoiding a car that almost hit him, He found himself saying his own name out loud and telling himself how stupid he could be..

Most of us do it. When something doesn’t go as we expect or we make a mistake, it doesn’t take long for that eager voice of conscience to come out telling us how clumsy or useless we are. AND It is that, that persistent negative internal dialogue that leads us to serious states of helplessness and dangerously bordering the abyss of depression.. Let’s avoid it, let’s change the discourse.

Talking to yourself, key to health

Professor Ethan Kross, mentioned above, carried out a series of experiments at the University of Michigan where he concluded with something as interesting as it was useful: people who talked to themselves and who began their dialogues by saying their name were more successful in their lives, they showed greater personal security and perceived themselves as happier.

It may seem naive to us at first glance. However, talking to ourselves allows us something that we cannot ignore: The brain works much better, its perception capacity is more skillful and we also manage our emotional world appropriately.. Therefore, we are not faced with any formula taken out of our sleeve, Internal dialogue has a clear benefit backed by science, and there are many studies that have shown us this..

Let’s see more data in detail.

Dialogue with oneself improves our intellectual capacity

Talking to ourselves will not make us smarter overnight. What will happen is that We will improve our intellectual capacity, that is, we will enhance our attention, our ability to reflect.we will decide better, our concentration will be more focused and we will control distractions.

Something as simple as telling ourselves that “Let’s see María, focus more and think about what you are going to do about this problem…” or “Carlos, you are wasting your time uselessly, calm down and reflect on what is happening”, It will undoubtedly help us improve many of our cognitive processes.

Talking to yourself improves self-esteem

Each of us lives in a certain environment and with a series of people with whom we get along better or worse. However, beyond all that context, who we really share life with is ourselves. Why exclude us from that equation then? Why not meet yourself throughout the day for tea or coffee and talk about how everything is going?

No one will call us crazy, and anyone who does is surely missing out on one of the best self-help and personal growth techniques. These are some small samples of it.

Talking to ourselves allows us to “focus on the present moment with present emotions” to become aware of them, understand them, manage them. Internal dialogue is also a powerful source of motivation, the most sincere, the most reliable and the one that should never fail us. Thus, and even in the most adverse situations, nothing can be more energetic than telling ourselves that “Go ahead, Angela, you’re having a hard time but you can’t give up now, let’s go.”On the other hand, something that is also explained to us in a publication of the ““Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology” the thing is When we speak out loud we activate a “switch” in the cerebral cortex, the one where the consciousness of the “I” settles.. In this way, we develop better psychological control to think more clearly and more efficiently. Likewise, by giving way to that calmer and more confident inner voice, we gain perspective and relativize negative and ruminative thoughts.

The benefits of self-talk are that these will only be possible if we are first able to control negative self-talk. “no matter what you do, everything is going to turn out wrong” or “you have made a mistake once again, it is clear that you have no remedy.”

Let’s avoid it. After all, there is nothing worse than becoming our own worst enemies. Let us remember, for example, the way in which Socrates defined thoughts: “they are an honest conversation that the soul has with itself.” Let us then try not to mistreat her, let us take care of her as the precious asset that she is and talk to her in a positive, constructive and emotional way.

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