Dispelling our negative narrator.
NLP Technique for Dispelling and Transforming Negative Self-Talk.
How much we care for ourselves outwardly depends on how much we care inwardly. The way we speak to ourselves directly affects how much self care we give.
We all have a negative narrator who has well and truly set up camp in our subconscious mind.
Here’s a quick exercise (NLP technique – see more on NLP here) to take your power back when your inner voice turns on you, catches you off guard and tries to overtake your thinking.
Any of these sound familiar?
You don’t know what you’re talking about, just stop speaking.
What makes you think you can achieve that? You can’t do that.
Who do you think you are? Stop now or you’ll make a fool of yourself.
You’re useless.
1. Picture a favourite cartoon character of yours. (Bugs bunny, Donald Duck) When you hear the cartoon voice, how does it make you feel? Think about how the voice sounds – tone, rhythm, pitch, become aware of it’s qualities and your feelings behind it.
2. Get you cartoon character to take a seat, and turn your attention towards your negative narrator self talk voice that you notice at times in your mind. When you hear that voice speak to you, try to listen with curiosity NOT judgement.
Note how it makes you feel and be aware of the qualities of the voice.
3. Now, replay the destructive words you heard from your negative narrator BUT this time imagine them being said in the cartoon characters voice, imagine another cartoon characters voice saying it now too.
Notice there is no longer power behind the words, the words are still the same but the perspective has changed and you no longer can take it seriously.
4. You can take this one step further and imagine the cartoon characters voice moving away, getting further away from you, sounding more distance and hard to hear until it becomes too hard to distinguish the words being said.
5. This exercise draws our awareness back into bodies and mind. Even if you feel just slightly better than when you first started hearing the original narrator voice you have made progress to turn these thoughts from negative to neutral or even positive. It loses its power over you.
