Just say ‘stop’ when you put yourself down

You might remember the old joke that goes something like this: “Don’t’ worry if you’re talking to yourself. It’s when you start answering yourself that you have a problem.”

The truth of the matter is, self-talk can be a very positive and powerful tool in improving one’s mental health.

In fact, we all talk to ourselves all day long. During these mental conversations we may be planning, worrying, rehearsing, and/or remembering. Additionally, we are also judging ourselves, often negatively.

For example, if you’re planning a trip you might be thinking to yourself, “I have never been to this place before, and I probably won’t get there without getting lost.”

While remembering, you might play a tape in your mind that goes something like “I was always unhappy as a child, and therefore I will probably never be happy as an adult.”

A mental rehearsal might include “I never seem to be able to win the big one, so I will probably lose today in the finals.”

These examples of negative self-talk and harsh subjective judgment of ourselves lead to low self-esteem. What we say to ourselves affects how we feel about ourselves.

This pattern of negative thinking often becomes more pervasive and frequent over time. A self-fulfilling prophecy develops so that as the Biblical scripture states, “As a man thinketh, so is he.”

To combat these ruminations and obsessive-negative thought patterns, the techniques of “thought stopping” is often found to be helpful. In this procedure, the individual is advised to yell the work “no” or “stop” several times in succession each time a negative thought occurs. This is to be repeated on every occurrence of any negative, self-defeating and depressing thought as a way to interfere and stop this destructive pattern.

In public, the individual is advised to whisper or think the word “no” or “stop” repeatedly when negative thoughts occur.

Although this technique may sound rather trite and simplistic, it is often very effective in helping disrupt a pattern of negative thinking. Remember, most of us have had years of practice with negative thinking. Thus, any system of disrupting such pattern has to be practiced consistently to produce beneficial results.

With some practice, you will become very good at blowing the whistle on yourself. You can then begin replacing the negative judgmental thought with positive self-talk.

Copyright c 2002 Harold H. LeCrone, Jr., Ph.D.