The Power Of Self-Talk In Relationships

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15:00

The Power Of Self-Talk In Relationships

by Anna Thellmann

Rated

4.9

Type

talks

Activity

Meditation

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Everyone

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101

(IT Live Recording) How we talk to ourselves directly impacts our confidence, emotional well-being, and ability to connect with others. Negative self-talk can create barriers in relationships, while positive self-talk fosters growth, understanding, and deeper intimacy.

Self Talk Relationships Emotional Well Being Self Worth Positive Affirmation Inner Critic Self Acceptance Nlp Visualization Relationship Conflict Emotional Resilience Visualization Exercises

Meet your Teacher

Shenyang, Liaoning, China

Meet your Teacher

Shenyang, Liaoning, China

Transcript

So we talk about the power of self-talk in relationship and the overarching topic I want to discuss today is negative self-talk. And when I say negative self-talk, What I mean by that here is talking bad about yourself. So we're not talking about how is it when you think bad stuff about other people or situations but about yourself. For example, I have three examples prepared to give you an idea of what are we talking about here. And the first one is your partner spends time with friends and you think I'm not lovable or you may think I'm not important enough or you may think I'm not entertaining enough as they are. And that goes on through your head as soon as you hear that your partner isn't at home or that he's doing something else until they come back and probably after as well. So it's a never ending story and it's a spiral. Another example could be that you forget an anniversary or to buy something, Go to the shop, Forget to buy some particular stuff and then you tell yourself I always mess things up or I'm so stupid. Or you might even tell yourself that why can't I just be better? Why can't I just be like Caroline from next door or whoever you find or believe that is in any way more worthy, Better, More intelligent, More beautiful, Whatever it is, Than you. Another example how negative self-talk could show up in your life in your relationship is you hesitate to share your thoughts in discussions. It can be with your partner alone or when you go out with friends and you're in this setting of maybe more couples together because you believe my opinion doesn't matter. Or you might also believe that I'm probably wrong anyway. What I say doesn't have any value. It doesn't add any value and it's probably wrong anyway and they will laugh at me. Yeah, That's the other one. They will laugh at me just like the others because it's coming from somewhere, Isn't it? So that is, These are a couple of examples how this self-talk, The negative self-talk can come up in your relationship, In different relationship situations. And the thing is, If you don't do anything about it or if you're so into it and don't even notice, You might even not notice that you have that negative self-talk, What will happen is that that negative self-talk is scratching away on your confidence or it might already have scratched away on your confidence. And that's no good for your relationship because what usually comes with not having enough confidence in your relationship is that your people please or that you put yourself first, Not first, Put your partner and everyone else first, But put yourself last. That you are a perfectionist, That everything needs to be perfect, Everything needs to be done right and you're right, No one else is right, But you're right. And that puts a lot of pressure on yourself and with that on your relationship. What also could happen is that because you have this negative self-talk in your head that you rely more on external validation, Particularly from your partner in particular areas or maybe from your friends, From your colleagues, From your manager. If it's about how good you're in your job, It's probably your manager who has to tell you how good you are, Otherwise you won't believe it, Otherwise you will just think I'm not that good. And another thing that could happen if you don't address this negative self-talk is it can increase conflict in your relationship. Now last week I told you that conflict is good for your relationship because it's just a difference in opinions and feelings and that's right. So it's still, I still stand to that one, But we're going a bit further here and what we want to avoid or what we want to learn to deal with is that emotional conflict that isn't just a difference in opinions and feelings and we don't take it just as that, But we take it as something personal. And that happens particularly when your emotional needs aren't met, Which you might not tell your partner. If you have all that negative self-talk in your head, You might feel worried that if you want something, If you say I need something, That they think of you differently, That they don't want to do it, That all these worries, All this idea come up in your head, Million of reasons why you shouldn't tell your partner and then you don't do it. You feel probably lonely, Alone. You feel like you don't deserve it and you don't get it because you don't say it and that causes conflict and worst case scenario, I would say it goes into resentment, Resenting your partner for not giving you what you need. But that might be because you haven't told them because you're afraid because you think you don't deserve it. So it's this circle, It's this vicious circle. In German we say Teufelskreis, Which is loosely translated as the devil's circle. So you're going around in this devil's circle and it's hard to get out. But if you get out, If you deal with that negative self-talk, Then of course you have a stronger sense of self-worth and that is very, Very good because you are worth a million bucks. No one else should tell you anything else, Not even you because you are perfect. You have healthier communication patterns. That is because you don't take things so personal because you think higher of yourself and if you think higher of yourself, If you think that, Yeah, Sometimes I talk crazy, I talk stupid, But that's okay. That's nothing negative. It's just like I accept myself the way I am and that's okay. No blame, No shame, No self-blame, No self-shame. And of course you have more balanced emotional connections because there is not this big canvas of where everyone can just attack you. Because you know, I'm perfectly perfect, Imperfectly perfect, That's how it goes, Imperfectly perfect and that's okay. And you mean it and then no one can do anything about it. So now the big question is what can you do to get there? And a very popular thing to do is positive affirmations and I'm fully on there. Yes, Affirmations are great, But there are a couple of things that you should be mindful of when you create your affirmations. Go back, I have a free track on affirmations. It's about 20 minutes and it explains why you should do what you should do. It's based in NLP, That's what I do with my clients as well, To the most important thing is not to make big jumps. You don't go from I'm not worth it to I'm worth a million bucks. You don't believe that. Nothing inside, You know, Five of you will believe that. So we need little steps that we can believe in. And when we get to that and we just like, You know, Feel like, Oh yeah, I can believe that I'm worth a pound, For example. And when you believe that and when that belief grows, You go to I'm worth a thousand bucks. And then you go from there till you reach the million bucks. But it's these little steps that you still need to believe in some way. If it's just out of the blue and something you can't imagine even having, It's hard to get there because you also know that your imagination, The law of abundance, Of attraction, It's all visualization. And if you can't visualize that, Then start with more with what you can visualize and then go from there. So build on it. So that's the first step. The other one is, It's based on the small jumps as well. It's instead of I can't, Which often comes with when you don't think you're good enough. I can't do this. I can't go there. Oh, No, No, No. I can't. I can't do this presentation, Whatever it is. Yeah. Maybe you want to try. What if I tried? Yeah. What if I tried? No expectations, No pressure on you. Just like, Hmm, What might happen if I tried? Don't go from I can't to of course I can. Again, It's a big jump and you probably won't believe in it. What if we love that? What if what if you can't do it? And the last one is address that voice because those thoughts, It's based on the inner critic, The judge, The devil on your shoulder, Whatever you want to call it. But I think most of us have heard about the inner critic, That voice in our heads. And I explain this to my one-on-one clients when we do the visualization that it's a voice you hear and you believe it's your voice. You believe this is me. I am like this. I am that I think that I'm unlovable, That I'm not worth it. This is who I am. And that's actually not the case. It's part of who I am, But it's not just, This is you. You are many, Many other parts as well. So this voice tells you that and in its most simple way, It wants to keep you protected from emotional harm. It wants you to be safe, To feel safe. That's why when it tells you in a group discussion, Don't say that you might be emotionally harmed if you say something and the other laugh at you, That might hurt you. You might feel embarrassed. So the voice tells you, Don't do that. No, No, No, No, Don't do that. We don't want to do that. Let's just keep quiet because we want to protect you. This voice is there to protect you. But as you grow older and you now grow in person, You don't need that protection anymore because you understand the world, How it works. You understand why people are sometimes nice, Why people are sometimes not nice, Et cetera. And that voice was great when you were younger, When you didn't have that information about how the world works. But now you're grown up. Now, You know, You don't need it anymore, But it's there because you got so comfortable with it. So my third step that you could do is to call that voice out whenever that voice comes up, Whenever you realize, When you become aware that, Oh, I'm thinking these negative talks in my head about myself, Just say, Hey, I got you. But loving with all the love that you can master in that moment, Put all the love in and say, Thank you for looking out for me. I've got this. And that's it. Like I said, With my one-on-one clients, I usually do visualizations so that we can see that inner critic and know who it is, Ask questions to have a great picture and befriend it. But we won't do that here today. But I think I have a visualization in one of my courses in the body shame course. I think the second or third track on that course is the inner critic visualization. So if you have premium, Go there, Do the visualization, Visualization exercise and befriend your inner critic. And whenever you become aware, Oh, Here's the inner critic. Thank you for looking out for me. I've got this. And be aware that you might not be aware very often. I have one-on-one clients that tell me, Oh, My inner critic hasn't talked to me this week, Only once. And I say, I don't really believe that. But let's recap, Because at the beginning, You might not notice because you're so used to that voice. You're so used to listen to that voice. And you're so used to having that voice as your guiding light. So be patient with yourself. And that brings me to the end of my talk today.