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Sticks and stones breaking bones and words not hurting is a chant of childhood that doesn’t hold water when you really think about it. Words can definitely hurt — and your words to yourself can be some of the most damaging of all. Overcoming negative self-talk can help positively impact recovery, general mental health, and your overall quality of life.
What Is Self-Talk?
Self-talk is the internal dialogue you have with yourself. It includes specific thoughts that you might “speak” to yourself in your head or out loud, but it also encompasses your perceptions and beliefs. Self-talk can be:
- Positive. Positive self-talk is affirming. It might include actual affirmations, such as “I am good at this,” or other confident thoughts that help boost internal morale.
- Negative. This type of self-talk is negating. It might include thoughts such as “I am terrible at this” or “No one likes me.” The result of negative self-talk can be a decrease in confidence, issues with self-image or internal stress.
- Neutral. Neutral self-talk is neither positive nor negative. It can include thoughts about things that don’t impact your well-being or motivation or self-talk that’s fact-based, such as “I have to get up at 8 a.m. if I want to be on time.”
Understanding the Power of Self-Talk
Self-talk can be powerful. Positive self-talk has been shown to contribute to benefits such as:
- Increased self-esteem
- Better performance
- The ability to cope better with emotions
- Increased resilience
- Increase motivation
- Higher levels of fun with certain activities
- Reduced performance anxiety
- Better overall health and lower rates of issues like cardiovascular disease or stroke
- Better overall mental health and lower rates of issues like depression
To understand the impact of self-talk on performance, researchers in one study looked at dysfunctional and constructive self-talk in 177 undergraduate participants. They found that individuals who engaged in constructive self-talk were more likely to be satisfied with outcomes and have higher self-efficacy than those who engaged in dysfunctional self-talk.
According to another study, which included 150,000 women aged 50 to 79, more optimism correlates with a longer potential life. Researchers found that the women in the study who were most optimistic lived around 4.5 years longer than the women who were least optimistic.
Recognizing Patterns of Negative Self-Talk
Because positive self-talk has positive life benefits and negative self-talk has a potentially negative impact on your life and health, learning how to be less negative is important. The first step is learning to recognize that you need to change your thought patterns.
Here are some signs that you may be stuck in patterns of negative self-talk:
- Recurring critical thoughts that belittle yourself, your body, or your endeavors
- Exaggerated thoughts that include words like never and always, especially when paired with negatives like “can’t”
- Fear-based thoughts, particularly those rooted in worry over potential failures
- Constantly dismissing wins, such as attributing your successes to other people or sheer luck when you worked hard for something
- Persistent pessimism about the future, including thinking things can’t work out for you
- Feelings of guilt or shame as consistent companions to your self-talk
How Does Negative Thinking Impact Mental Health?
Negative thought processes can have an impact on mental health, leading to increased stress, depression, and anxiety. When your internal dialogue consistently includes critical thoughts and pessimism, you create a pattern — or habit — of that type of thinking. It becomes natural for you to respond to both internal and external stimuli with negative thoughts.
This type of chronic negative thinking leads to poor outcomes for mental and physical health. What might start with thinking you can’t achieve something — whether it’s a milestone at work, a personal wellness goal, or a fun objective — leads to thoughts that you can’t do anything right, you aren’t good enough or something is wrong with you.
The cycle of negative thoughts, if it persists, can lead to feelings of hopelessness and helplessness. These states can contribute to depression and other mental health issues. They can also lead to you giving up on your goals or other efforts, leading to a self-fulfilling prophecy that seems to validate your initial negative thoughts, strengthening the cycle.
Techniques to Reframe Negative Thoughts
If you want to learn how to be less negative, you must work on reframing your thoughts. You can do this by:
- Practicing gratitude. Focusing on what you have to be thankful for can shift your perception and take your thoughts off negative patterns.
- Engaging in positive affirmations. Reframe negative thoughts into positive ones. If you think “I will never be able to do that,” reframe it as “I have the opportunity to try this.”
- Noticing distortions in thinking. Be on the watch for phrases like never or always or thought patterns that make things seem catastrophic. Stop and ask yourself if these thoughts are true — what evidence supports this type of thinking? Chances are, you can talk yourself into downsizing the catastrophe based on real-world thinking.
- Embracing challenges. Instead of dwelling on mistakes, view them as an opportunity to learn and grow.
- Focusing on solutions. Focus more on potential solutions than the problems you might face.
- Removing external negative feedback loops. Reduce unnecessary external sources of negative thought, such as the comparison mentality that can occur with social media.
Building a Positive Inner Dialogue for the Future
Don’t stop working on changing negative self-talk to positive self-talk. Keep developing habits of positive thinking so you eventually build a habitually positive inner dialogue.
Some people worry that if they engage in positive self-talk too often, they’ll become unrealistic. In reality, healthy, positive self-talk maintains a strong connection with reality. Healthy self-talk considers the practical implications of life at any given moment and focuses on solutions, potential positive outcomes, and what’s in a person’s control at the moment.
Get Help Overcoming Negative Self-Talk Now
If you’re struggling with negative self-talk, mental health or substance abuse issues, you may not feel like anything is under your control. However, here’s something that is: your choice to reach out and seek help.
Get help overcoming negative self-talk and other mental health issues from compassionate, experienced providers at FHE Health. Contact us now to discuss your situation and discover potential treatment options.
