“We should behave to our friends as we would wish our friends to behave to us”
Aristotle
This is part 1 of a 3 part series about creating the mindset for achievement (please also check out “The Power of Questions” and “How to Remove Your Fears“). These ideas are at the foundation of really achieving goals and improving your life.
As you read these articles they will cause you to change your life. These ideas are about the way you think and ensuring you get the best out of yourself and live up to your capabilities. The words in your head are like the fuel for your life. You know the language in your head really does have a great effect on what happens on the outside.
Knowing this, you can understand that you want to make sure you have the best damn fuel for YOUR life. The lucky thing, simple changes can have a huge effect so you really owe it to yourself to think about the language you use within your head. Just understanding these ideas will cause huge changes.
The first step here is to become your own best friend. The first time you listen to your self-talk and what you say to yourself you may be shocked. You wouldn’t say stuff like it to your friends or family but you are saying it to yourself on a daily basis.
When you really consider it, its repulsive the language that you often use. The first thing you will notice in your brain is that there is a “me” and an “I”… or 2 different characters. The “I” always talks about “me”. Sometimes even behind my back!! So when you listen you will notice that you often talk about yourself as “You”. i.e. “You know you don’t stand a chance with that guy”
I tried really listening to myself and was SHOCKED. I listed all the negative and positive things I always say to myself.. I wrote them out on paper, it took about 30 minutes and ended up with a pretty long list… on the negative side and 4 or 5 things on the positive side.
This is something I want you to try as well now. Here is an example of what I came up with.
Negative:
- You’re ugly
- You have a huge nose
- You can’t find a decent job
- You are poor
- You find it difficult to make friends
- You’ve got huge debts which will take forever to pay off
- You can’t speak
- You’re are shy
- You don’t know what to say to new people you meet
- You never finish anything
- You are lazy
Positive:
- You are a good friend and trustworthy
- People can get along with you easily
- You’re fun and quick witted
- You’re happy
- You’re a great sportsman
That’s pretty much all the positive stuff I came up with and just a little of the negative. When I first looked at it I was stunned. I looked at some of the stuff and thought…if I said that to I friend they would kill me. That realization changed me and when you decide to try this , soon it will change you too.
Before you decide to do this, you have to make the mental choice to eliminate all the negative stuff. There is no point just looking at all the negative stuff that pops out and just saying “oh!”. You will need to spend some time to replace it with positive things. Write these down on the positive side and then practice asking yourself questions with positive presuppositions for these items.
Catch yourself in the act. Say “STOP!” when you hear yourself criticizing you. After that focus on something you wrote down as a positive (this is a great sentence to use to change your focus), and continue on with a smile.
Simply, become your best friend. Encourage and cajole yourself. Challenge yourself, tell yourself you are doing well or you did a great job. Give yourself a treat. Look after yourself and tell yourself how great you are.
Literally pat yourself on the back from time to time. You are going to enjoy doing this and enjoy the change it will bring about in yourself.
Becoming your best friend is the best thing you can do… you will always be there for yourself to pick you up and push you on. Once you start you will find yourself naturally encouraging yourself more and more. You will experience how the more you do it the more powerful the change will be.
The Task:
List the positive and negative things you say to yourself. Now, eliminate the negative and replace them with more positive things you want to say about yourself. Stop and catch yourself in the act when you do say something negative about yourself. Just become a good friend to you.
