Last post I was talking about connecting with the inner voice to assist in learning. The more you can leverage your internal dialogue the easier it will be to change behaviours.
In fact, imagine that you are trying to put a plan of action into play but are stopped by your internal dialogue. What might the internal dialogue be?
Internal persona: ‘That idea won’t work’
Your response: ‘Yes it will’
Internal persona: ‘It certainly won’t and you’ll make a fool out of yourself’
You’ll then either back down or escalate the conversation!
The challenge often is that the more you are trying to battle against the internal persona, the louder the voice shouts back. Bear in mind also that these ‘conversations’ internally happen within seconds and while your internal persona may be one that says ‘What a great idea!’ be prepared for a negative response and have a strategy for dealing with it.
The trick is to identify the voice, and talk to it as if you were trying to make a person of that age or tone change their mind, i.e. shouting at it or arguing with it would not generally get the desired outcome. A reasoned, caring, allowing approach would work much better.
Typical internal personae could be:
• Wise, older people who you think know best
• Stroppy teenager
• Child
Either way, the more you can acknowledge that point of view, feedback or input but make the decision to think something else, then the greater leverage for change you will create.
Using the example above it might be:
Older internal persona: ‘That idea won’t work’,
Internal response: ‘I can understand that you might think that but I’m going to give it a go. Thanks for your input.’
The more reasonable you are in the discussion, the easier it will be to change. Experiment and enjoy really understanding your inner voice.