Pair #54 Different inside and out?
Reading Ali Campbell’s book this week Just Get On With It! reminded me just how important it is to take a moment to become aware of the way our minds can work to sometimes sabotage our best laid plans (and lives!) and just how much we can actually do about it.
Ali has a great exercise where he suggests the following:
“I want you to imagine that everyone around you can hear your thinking. Imagine that everyone can hear your every thought.. How different would you be?”
He’s talking about how horrified we’d be if others could hear us and how different we are on the inside compared to what we try to portray on the outside. He’s pointing out the conflict we create inside ourselves and goes on to explain how to find your way through a conflicted, overthinking mind.
The reason I like this, and his book, so much is because when you actually picture and hear the kinds of things that you say to yourself on a regular basis, something else happens too...
You realize how mean you are to yourself
Most of us tolerate saying things to ourselves that we would never, ever tell a small child: how stupid we are, how useless we are, how pointless things are.
If our constant internal diarrhea would be embarrassing or unpleasant to speak outloud - just imagine the damage it’s doing! And of course, it’s not “it” doing this. It’s actually us.
If you can’t speak your inner dialogue aloud, why are you saying it at all?
I want to hear a really good reason.
By the way, Ali’s book is full of great exercises to help you hear yourself, know yourself and discover how you can change things in your life. I recommend it highly!
Ali has a great exercise where he suggests the following:
“I want you to imagine that everyone around you can hear your thinking. Imagine that everyone can hear your every thought.. How different would you be?”
He’s talking about how horrified we’d be if others could hear us and how different we are on the inside compared to what we try to portray on the outside. He’s pointing out the conflict we create inside ourselves and goes on to explain how to find your way through a conflicted, overthinking mind.
The reason I like this, and his book, so much is because when you actually picture and hear the kinds of things that you say to yourself on a regular basis, something else happens too...
You realize how mean you are to yourself
Most of us tolerate saying things to ourselves that we would never, ever tell a small child: how stupid we are, how useless we are, how pointless things are.
If our constant internal diarrhea would be embarrassing or unpleasant to speak outloud - just imagine the damage it’s doing! And of course, it’s not “it” doing this. It’s actually us.
If you can’t speak your inner dialogue aloud, why are you saying it at all?
I want to hear a really good reason.
By the way, Ali’s book is full of great exercises to help you hear yourself, know yourself and discover how you can change things in your life. I recommend it highly!
© 2010 Elese Coit
If you wish to reprint, feel free, please link back here and if it's of use, include:
"Elese Coit is a leader in transformative personal change and Hosts the Radio Show A New Way To Handle Absolutely Everything. To see the world differently, reach for one of her '101 New Pairs of Glasses' each day on http://elesecoit.com"
Thank you.
If you wish to reprint, feel free, please link back here and if it's of use, include:
"Elese Coit is a leader in transformative personal change and Hosts the Radio Show A New Way To Handle Absolutely Everything. To see the world differently, reach for one of her '101 New Pairs of Glasses' each day on http://elesecoit.com"
Thank you.
