How to Stop Negative Self Talk and Harness Your Inner Voice

I think we all have a basic understanding that many of the issues that arise in our lives are a result of our inability to control and manage the voice in our head. Not only does this create problems, our ability to solve these problems strongly relies on how we use our thoughts and inner voice in those moments. They can either be used to our advantage and help us grow or to our disadvantage where they become “chatter.” Chatter is when the inner voice becomes toxic and destructive. It’s when we ruminate, obsess, and before we know it we are acting impulsively and making decisions that are not aligned with who we want to become. This leads to turmoil in our lives that can damage our health, careers, relationships and our sense of self if we are not careful. But, there is good news. There is a path forward and after listening to today’s episode you will have multiple tools that you can implement immediately to harness your inner voice, mitigate chatter and use your thoughts to improve your life.

Today’s guest is Ethan Kross. Ethan is one of the world’s leading experts on controlling the conscious mind and the inner voice. He is An award-winning professor in the University of Michigan’s top-ranked Psychology Department and its Ross School of Business, he studies how the conversations people have with themselves impact their health, performance, decisions, and relationships.

Ethan is also the best selling author of the newly released book “Chatter” The Voice in Our Head, Why it Matters and How to Harness It, which was chosen as one of the best new books of the year by the Washington Post, CNN and USA Today and the Winning Winter 2021 selection for Malcolm Gladwell, Adam Grant, Susan Cain, and Dan Pink’s Next Big Idea Book Club. This guy delivers an absolute masterclass on today’s show on the conscious mind, emotion regulation, our inner voice and thoughts, and of course chatter.

What I value about Ethan’s approach is that it’s simple, proactive and anyone can do it. There is no equipment, financial investment or massive time commitment required. Part of his solution to harnessing your inner voice is practicing things like “distancing” yourself from the situation, creating rituals in your life and controlling the environment around you. Ethan also covers a few tactics that you may think work for controlling our negative thoughts that are actually counterproductive.

This is a discussion that goes into great detail into what your inner voice is, how it’s different from chatter, and why talking to yourself is actually healthy. We also get into how to “hold space” for someone in a way that will help them move forward and why running to social media to share your problems isn’t always the best approach. The cool thing is that many of the strategies that Ethan teaches are also useful for emotional regulation which is also part of today’s conversation. This episode helps you manage chatter in the present moments as well as the future and ultimately assist you in letting the voice in your head become your greatest ally.