Talk to yourself; don’t listen!

Growing up I was the 3rd child of 6 kids. Those of you who have siblings can agree with how they are your best friends at times and your worst enemy the other times.

This is my younger sister Kayla.

Aint’ she a beaut?! She’s my inspiration for this weeks post!

Here’s the thing though; growing up we always tended to tease her and let her be the butt of our jokes. If you have siblings you might have a “scapegoat” sibling as well in your family. As we got older though I didn’t know how this could affect her.

After learning more about mindset and how powerful it is I started to think about my siblings. Could all of that teasing alter her mindset negatively and have her start to believe what we told her? Did I take part in potentially destroying her confidence?

We all have had negative things said about us and we have to agree that it hurts. Whoever said, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me,” was a COMPLETE liar who was never bullied or teased.

Words hurt.

How can we combat this so it doesn’t affect our confidence, self-esteem, self-worth, and our success? Well, we need to STOMP OUT THOSE ANTS!

Have you ever had ants in your kitchen before? I bet you normally don’t find just one. There are usually a whole line stampeding through your countertop. Am I right? It’s gross and we need to fight these annoyances before they multiply further.

In graduate school, my mentor, Cindra Kamphoff, told me that we all have ants in our minds as well. We all experience Automatic Negative Thoughts. In order to not let it affect us, we need to take control and FIGHT BACK! We need to stomp out those ants in our mind, just like we do in our kitchen. Exterminate them by using POSITIVE self-talk to overcome them.

“Talk to yourself, don’t listen.”

You have a choice here. You don’t have to listen to what the ants are telling you. Instead try this exercise to get rid of the ants before they continue to multiply:

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1. Catch them:

Catch the negative thoughts you are having. We need to NOTICE when ants are entering and taking over our minds. Once you notice and are self-aware of where your thoughts are you can move onto the next step.

2. Address them:

Look at the ant in the face and tell it to go away! Address whatever it is telling you and find ways to fight back. For example; if the ants are telling you that you can’t do it talk back to it by saying, “Yes I can do it with continuous effort and focus. I will show you!”

3. Release them:

Release the ant and make it focus on something else. Once you have addressed you need to let it go. Let the ant crawl away out of your mind the same way that it entered.

4. End them:

Now it is time to EXTERMINATE the ant. It has now left your mind and you need to tell yourself a positive affirmation. Replace it with purposeful positive affirmations such as, “You are beautiful,” “You’ve got this!”

My sister Kayla has been putting this plan into place and has been stomping out her ants. Remember that these ants are AUTOMATIC so they will come out of nowhere at times and instead of becoming upset and frustrated we need to TAKE CONTROL and kick them back out.

This past week Kayla saw the movie, “I Feel Pretty,” and posted the picture above with great positive self-talk statements to start her day feeling powerful, beautiful, and confident! Here was her caption,

“So many days we struggle with what we see in the mirror, but today I looked at that mirror and told myself that I am beautiful, I am intelligent, I am strong, I am worthy and guess what? Today I feel pretty. ?”

What are you telling yourself? May we all learn from Kayla and remember, “talk to yourself, don’t listen to the ANTS!”