Conversations With And About Yourself

When, in everyday parlance, we say that someone talks to himself, we are usually feeling somewhat disquieted by it.

Psychiatrists know that people who appear to be talking to themselves, often by seeming to be mumbling under their breath, are usually hearing voices, that is, suffering auditory hallucinations. In most cases these are a sign of schizophrenia.

And yet, we all have mental dialogues. We hold imaginary conversations in our minds, without moving our lips or believing that God is telling us what to do. These are not the same as ruminations or fantasies or even introspective voyages of self-discovery.

As motivational psychologists define them, these conversations, this self-talk, are sometimes used to evaluate past action or motivate future action. You might tell yourself that you really messed up or you might tell yourself to take a leap of faith.

I suspect that these conversations are mental habits. If so, they are easier to control than we might imagine. All that is required is a mechanical fix,  a different set of instructions. You cannot change them by gaining more self-awareness or insight. 

Elizabeth Bernstein broaches the topic this morning in the Wall Street Journal:

"What happens with self-talk is you stimulate your action, direct your action and evaluate your action," says Antonis Hatzigeorgiadis, associate professor at the University of Thessaly in Trikala, Greece, who studies self-talk and the psychology of sports performance.

Motivational self-talk includes what we say to psych ourselves up: "Come on!" "Let's go!" "You can do this!" Instructional self-talk walks us through a specific task. If you are driving, you might tell yourself to turn right at the next light, and then you do it. "It sounds simple, but you get the correct reaction," says Dr. Hatzigeorgiadis.

Instructional self-talk is helpful when learning or practicing a new sport or task, he says. For example, a swimmer can remind himself to keep his elbow high during freestyle. Before giving a speech, someone might tell herself, "Speak slower" and "Make eye contact."

Note that the last two phrases are all in the second person. They sound like something that someone else would tell you. “Speak slower” is grammatically distinct from: “I must speak slower.”

Try asking yourself this: when you converse with yourself do you use the first or the second person pronoun?

Strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, this reminds us of a curious aspect of Freudian theory.

As you know, Freud named two psychic agencies the ego and the id. In his German they were das Ich and das Es. Translating everyday German pronouns into Latin might feel especially sophisticated, but Freud was really using everyday pronouns. His English translators should have called them: the I and the It.

Note well that this dyad of I and It leaves no place You. Effectively, it traps you in your mind. Is it any wonder that psychoanalysis should have produced an epidemic of narcissism?

Surprisingly, when it comes to motivation, You matters more than I. Studies have shown that you will be more motivated when you address yourself, in your mental conversations, as You, not as I.

Bernstein reports:

The way you address yourself matters, too. Research published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in February found people who spoke to themselves as another person would—using their own name or the pronoun "you"—performed better under stress than people who used the word "I."

Addressing yourself in the second person makes you into someone else, something other to yourself. It is no longer about how you feel about yourself or whether you are grounded in your Self. It is more about how you look to others, especially to a person who wants what is good for you.

Bernstein explains:

In one study, University of Michigan researchers induced stress in participants by telling them they had to prepare a speech to give to a panel of judges about their qualifications for a dream job. They were given five minutes to prepare and told they couldn't use notes.

Half the participants were instructed to work through their anxiety using the first-person pronoun ("Why am I nervous?"). The other half were told to address themselves by name or the pronoun "you" ("Why are you nervous?"). Afterward, each participant was asked to estimate how much shame he or she experienced right after the speech, and how much subsequent ruminating they did.

The results were consistent: People whose self-talk used their names or "you" reported less shame and ruminated less than the ones who used "I." The judges found the performances of those using "you" to be more confident, less nervous and more persuasive.

So much for the virtue of introspection. Apparently, using the first person pronoun makes people more self-conscious. Using the second person pronoun puts them in the right frame of mind, to take action in the world and, therefore, to be looked at by others. To use You is to see yourself as others see you. To use I is to present yourself to yourself.

Of course, you are going to be judgmental:

Both positive and negative words can influence us in positive and negative ways. Say to yourself, "This job interview is going to be a cakewalk," and you might not get pumped up enough to ace it. Conversely, tell yourself, "You just lost that match, you need to focus harder," and it could spur you to do better in the future.

With critical self-talk, identify why you are being negative and focus on making it better. Don't say: "I bombed that presentation." Say: "That wasn't your best effort. You need to buckle down now and try harder."

The results were consistent: People whose self-talk used their names or "you" reported less shame and ruminated less than the ones who used "I." The judges found the performances of those using "you" to be more confident, less nervous and more persuasive.

When people think of themselves as another person, "it allows them to give themselves objective, helpful feedback," says Ethan Kross, associate professor of psychology and director of the Self-Control and Emotion Laboratory at the University of Michigan.

It’s not just that you are looking at yourself through someone else’s eyes. This other person is not just anyone. He is not a punishing superego. He is a benevolent adviser, someone who has your best interest at heart, someone whose words you are inclined to respect and to heed.