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What the voice inside your head says about you
The thoughts in your mind
We are so intimate with our thoughts that we never really stop to pay close attention to our wandering minds. When we do look at our thoughts, they turn out to be more interesting than we imagined.
A 2013 review points to huge individual differences between people in how much time they spend talking to themselves in their heads. Some people continually speak to themselves, while other people never talk to themselves internally.
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The thoughts in your mind
We are so intimate with our thoughts that we never really stop to pay close attention to our wandering minds. When we do look at our thoughts, they turn out to be more interesting than we imagined.
A 2013 review points to huge individual differences between people in how much time they spend talking to themselves in their heads. Some people continually speak to themselves, while other people never talk to themselves internally.
Inner experiences
There are five categories of inner experiences:
- Inner speaking, which comes in many forms
- Inner seeing, which comes from things you've seen in real life or imaginary visuals
- Feeling, such as happiness or anger
- Sensory awareness, like being aware of the feeling of a carpet
- Unsymbolized thinking, which is a thought that doesn't manifest as words or images.
Different inner voices
Most of us are aware of the internal dialogue – rather than a monologue - where we talk to someone inside our head. Often, that other voice is another aspect of ourselves.
There are four kinds of inner voices: the faithful friend, the ambivalent parent, the proud rival, and the helpless child. We might adopt these different roles to help ourselves get through situations.
Our thoughts may be wrong
Not everyone is convinced that people think accurately. Philosopher Eric Schwitzgebel argues that people are prone to considerable introspective error under any condition.
Further studies revealed that what people say they are thinking about does match up with what is really going on.
Motivation for inner speech
Our motivations for inner speech are many and varied.
Students in a study were found talking to themselves about everything from school to their emotions, other people, and themselves while they were doing everyday tasks.
The role of inner speech
Inner speech plays an important role in self-regulation behavior, problem-solving, critical thinking, and future thinking.
There's also growing evidence that inner speech is useful for self-reflection. Learning to tune in to your thoughts is a way to communicate with yourself using a meaningful structure.
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The organic and unpredictable nature of conspiracy theories had led many researchers to investigate the cause of the phenomenon.
- Successful conspiracy theories always tend to invent a great villain, have a backdrop or a backstory, and a morality lesson that can be easily understood by most.
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Every society has its own, unique anxieties and obsessions, and the conspiracy theories that gain good mileage are the ones that tap into these primal fears.
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Benefits of self-distancing
- It can help people cope with difficult events from their past.
- It can help people deal with socially distressful situations.
- Useful because of our tendency to display high levels of wise reasoning when we give advice to others, but not when we decide how to act for ourselves.
- It reduces decisional biases and improves decision-making during times of information overload.
How to create self-distance
- Use self-distancing language: refer to yourself in the second or third-person.
- Try to view the situation from an alternative viewpoint, that is different from your own.
- Try to visualize the perspective of someone you admire, and then ask yourself what would they do in that situation.
- Try expressive writing: write about your thoughts and feelings when you’re trying to analyze an event that you’ve experienced.
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Mentor #1: The Master of Craft
They are like actual Jedi masters who possess wisdom acquired from experiences.
Turn to this person when you need advice about launching a new initiative or brainstorming where you should work next
Mentor #2: The Champion of Your Cause
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False pasts
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Understand the future
Many of us think of our past as a kind of a video library where we can look at records of our lives. If memories were fixed like videotapes, you would find it difficult to imagine a new situation.
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Mindful Writing
Writing benefits from the capacities that mindfulness cultivates: being in the moment, even when remembering the past or imagining the future; not judging others and oneself while still exercising discriminating wisdom; holding multiple perspectives; being open to the new; and practicing kindness, compassion, and patience.
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Encourage positive distractions
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Allow worrisome thoughts
If you’re unable to sleep because you’re fixated on something stressful that’s happening the next day, it’s common to want to push those thoughts from your mind. However, doing so may hurt more than it helps.
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