Are You Listening to Yourself?

Are you listening to yourself?  What do you hear yourself repeating over and over again?  Pay attention.  Is there something you say repeatedly to someone in your life?  If the answer is yes, that message is for you! 

Relationships are these fabulous mirrors.  We create relationships externally that reflect the relationships we have with ourselves.   We teach others how to treat us.  People treat us the way we believe they will treat us.  Someone may see you one way in the beginning but over time, you will convince them of your belief you have of yourself and eventually they will start treating you the way you “thought” they would.  Our relationships are our greatest teachers. 

This is a great example of what I mean.  I had been telling my daughter for weeks “I don’t want to be talked to like that.”  “I don’t like that tone.”  Yet it just kept going.  I felt like she was complaining A LOT.  It always seemed to happen when she didn’t get her way.  Which is typical for a 7 year old but this was overkill.  It was really starting to wear on me.  I also noticed that I was the only one she was taking the tone with.  So I started paying more attention to see what the situation was trying to teach me.  It finally hit me. 

I’ve been working with my self-talk for years.  I thought I was being pretty nice to myself.  Yet, here I was.  I had done something that wasn’t the best idea for me.  Ok, I don’t usually regret things but I was not happy with myself.  And that’s when I noticed it.  There was part of me in there just complaining nonstop!!  Going on and on about how badly I had screwed up.  Blah, blah, blah….Complaining up a storm! 

So I started paying more attention to my inner talk again and sure enough, when things didn’t go my way, part of me was chronically complaining about it.  Things would flow along good as long as things were going my way but when something didn’t go my way, there it was!  Blah, blah, blah……

The coolest part is that once you shine a light on these things, oftentimes they just drop away.  Both internally and externally.  Awareness is amazing!  And sometimes they take repeated focus to shift things.

Start listening to the things you are telling others this week.  Pay particular attention to the things that get repeated.  Then pay attention to your own internal conversations and see if that message is really intended for you.