Most of us spend a lot of time listening to the voice in our heads, especially when it turns negative. This week Carly looks at what happens when you start answering back instead.

She explores research by psychologist Ethan Kross showing that talking to yourself using “you” or your own name helps you perform better under stress and see challenges as less threatening. She also looks at how Marcus Aurelius used his private journal to coach himself.

In this episode:

• Why we listen to our negative self-talk as if it’s the truth
• How using your own name creates helpful distance
• The sage and the gremlin
• A simple way to coach yourself in the moment

Sources:

• Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cure (1965)
• Kross et al. (2014), “Self-talk as a regulatory mechanism: How you do it matters,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
• Moser et al. (2017), “Third-person self-talk facilitates emotion regulation without engaging cognitive control,” Scientific Reports
• Ethan Kross, Chatter (2021)
• Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Read the companion article on Substack: [link]