5 Steps To Talk To Yourself Like You Would To Someone You Love

Talk to yourself like you would to someone you love. I know we all have heard of this phrase quite often after it was popularized by Bréne Brown. But, exactly how do we do it?

Now, first of all, I don’t know who needs to have these step-by-step formulas to overcome the negative thoughts looping in your mind, but I certainly need it. 

I’ll walk you through the steps that I take to make myself feel better and talk to myself with compassion. Feel free to tweak these methods and steps to meet your needs and cater to your situation.

My Experience

As a 35 and single woman living alone, I often feel lonely, especially when I come home to an empty house and have nobody to share my day with.

They say you have to watch your thoughts when you are alone. This is very true because the thoughts that you have in your mind can affect your mood and if you’re not having a high level of self-awareness, you can become a victim of negative thoughts swirling in your mind.

As much as we all love avoiding negative feelings thinking that we need to be positive, it can lead to toxic positivity and make things worse because we are not allowing the negative thoughts and emotions to be acknowledged. 

When I need to take time off, I would tell myself that I will have a day off over the weekend, and I will do nothing but just feel whatever I need to feel. 

Imagine a kid pasturing the parents to bring him or her to the beach. You would tell the kid that all of you can go to the beach on Sunday morning.

The mind is now like a kid. I would do what it needs to make myself feel better and also never betray the promise that I make to myself. As I’m healing, I would list down the things that made my mind better. And, that comes after analyzing what made my mind get stuck in the vicious cycle.

I would then talk to myself and promise myself that I have the best of the tools on the wall to assist me in feeling better. This could range from dancing, listening to the type of music that I like, and just everything else that I love doing. 

The next time I sense that I am spending more than 30 seconds entertaining negative thoughts, I would catch myself and quickly distract myself to watch a documentary or probably a motivational video to shake the negative thoughts off my body.

Remember, you cannot always avoid your emotions first, therefore, crying is a great way to let go of your fears and sorrows. So, I allow myself to feel sad and cry when I need to just feel the emotions before I let them go once and for all.

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5 Steps To Talk To Yourself Like You Would To Someone You Love 

1. Tell Yourself “I See You” When You Are Struggling

Now, imagine that you saw a news flash on Facebook about your ex getting together with your friend and it made you feel sad. It can be shocking, it can be something that you did not expect. First, love yourself. With a lot of emotions surfacing in your mind right now, you might be struggling to stop the negative emotions. 

As much as you would want to run away from these feelings, you cannot unsee what you have just seen. Tell yourself, “I see you and I can understand what you are going through at this point in time”. Imagine you are patting your back and consoling yourself. 

You may want to talk about it to someone or even vent your feelings to your friends. However, if you are at the workplace, what you can do is tell yourself that you see those emotions and you acknowledge them. These feelings are important for you and you should talk to yourself like you would to someone you love.

2. “Let’s Talk Saturday Morning 9 AM” – Schedule Worry Time

“Let’s talk Saturday morning at 9:00 a.m”. Cory Mascara says we should schedule a worry time for us to block the appropriate amount of time for us to honor our emotions.

So, if you are at the workplace, and you cannot give all your energy and attention to entertain or even feel your emotions, what you can do is promise yourself a worrying time. This would let your mind know that you have taken significant action to get back to it. 

The kid in the scenario given above will want to go to the beach on Sunday morning and will stay quiet until Sunday comes.

3. “Let’s Take a Quiet Moment To Feel Your Emotions”

So, it is Saturday night and your kid is going to be very excited about Sunday morning because it’s going to be the beach time for the kid. What happens on the day before is usually the kid going to the parents to inquire about the promise made earlier.

Similarly, if you have blocked Saturday morning at 9:00 a.m. as your worry time, make sure that you fulfill your promise. Complete all your work by Friday night sleep early and be ready to talk to yourself like you would to someone you love.

4. “So, Tell Me, What’s Bothering You” 

So, Sunday morning has arrived. Your mind would start to feel restless as your emotions rise. Ask yourself “So, tell me, what’s bothering you”.

I’m sure all sorts of emotions would visit your mind. Observe your mind like a patient is being treated by a therapist. 

Acknowledge what had happened without giving yourself any feedback or advice to rectify the “feel bad” phase. Feel bad for as long as you need and practice empathy.

Journal your thoughts to understand the chronological events that lead you to feel bad, while you talk to yourself like you would to someone you love. For instance: 

1. My friend is friends with my ex and she tagged him on her feed, and I saw him being with someone else who is my friend. 
2. A sudden bang of sadness and jealousy spiraled through my mind as I am still single. 
3. I felt betrayed by my own friend. How can she do this?
4. What can I do about this? Do I want to confront my friend? Do I want to snoop around and figure out how they got together? Or do I want to spend my energy wisely in the future?

5. “Here Are The Tools That Can Help You In Distress Next Time” 

Now that you have understood what led to a bad mood, you can identify what you can do to fully come out of the negative loop. 

Speaking from experience, I did this when I saw something popping up on my newsfeed. 

You can talk to yourself like you would to someone you love, like this:

1. I will immediately unfollow people who possibly have connections with my ex. 
2. I will give myself X amount of days to talk about it or vent about it to my friends.
3. Identify why I’m feeling bad. My ex is already trash and I don’t mind my friend getting him because I certainly do not want him.
4. I will focus on watching documentaries, practicing self-care, buying fragrance candles lighting them up on a Sunday night, and enjoying my time.

List down everything that has helped you in the past to shift from a bad mood to a good mood. Make sure that these tools are available to you easily. If you love the Middle East and music like me, you can start keeping up a playlist that you can instantly listen to to uplift your mood. Remember, talk to yourself like you would to someone you love.

FAQs

How to talk to yourself like someone you love?

Try compassionate self-talk whereby you talk to yourself lovingly on good days and also bad days. You do not judge yourself for having negative emotions. Imagine yourself as a kid who is turning to the mother for soothing their emotions when having difficult emotions. You have to talk to yourself like you would to your kid if your kid is throwing a tantrum or maybe even your friend if he or she is going through a difficult time.

How can I talk to someone I love?

1. Make room for compassionate talk and listen without judgment
2. Acknowledge their difficult feelings
3. Do not give advisors when they do not need our advice
4. Provide critical feedback carefully and avoid criticizing but talk in a calm manner when you need them to improve on something that you don’t like

How to make yourself talk to someone?

One way to make yourself talk to someone or encourage yourself to strike up a conversation with someone is to ask them something about themselves. This way, you would have control over the conversation and you would learn more about that person. Striking up a conversation with someone can be difficult by it will improve your confidence in talking to strangers.

How to speak lovingly to yourself?

When you identify negative self-talk, tell yourself that you see the negative emotions. Tell yourself that you are not the negative emotions. If you need to schedule worry time, allow yourself to pause the negative thoughts complete whatever you need to do that day, and tell yourself that you will come back to the negative thought at the end of the day. It is more like a self-date where you sit and ask yourself why you are feeling the way you are feeling.