I was watching some of my co-workers at my old job and how they talk to and interact with others, and how I interact with myself and realized some neat things. Along the same lines of my article on
Gratitude, what we talk about and think about changes our focus. I realized how the guys I was working with were talking negatively and how much that affected their job performance and their overall happiness. I also realized how a slight change in my language could help them, and how the same thing applies to us as we talk to ourselves.
As I was working alongside some guys at work, I noticed how upset they got and how often they apologized for making mistakes that I thought were pretty minor. When I said they were fine, no apology needed, it made a slight difference in their attitude, although not by much. But when I went further and let them know I thought they were doing a great job, and I was amazed that they were able to make so few mistakes with the difficult lot they'd been given, a very different thing happened: they started to realize that at least I thought they were doing a great job, and they made less mistakes and worked even harder.
At my other afternoon job, a similar thing happened. I had a manager who had been - albeit jokingly - saying how bad a job someone was doing. Another manager was (again jokingly) even more harsh in his criticism. I realized how both these approaches created a negative feeling from the individuals involved. While I know that the intention of these managers was to help inspire and motivate in a playful way, it diminished that person's sense of worth. I started bringing in some positive feedback, some words of encouragement and once again there was an evident change.
Thinking about all of this, I realized how the way I was speaking to myself, my "self-talk," about my circumstances and situations had begun to make me feel quite terrible about my circumstances. I'd begun to be less grateful, less happy, and generally more anxious and scared of those around me. A slight shift in my speaking has made a huge difference.
One area that I wanted to focus on was on how the way we speak to ourselves can help us focus on our agency and how this can help us feel less anxious and more secure.
One of the struggles with anxiety is a feeling of being powerless and helpless, that things are outside our control and that all is lost to us. Sometimes, the way we talk even encourages this assumption: "I have to get this done," "I should've done this better," etc. etc. This kind of language not only focuses us on negative things, but it also encourages an almost slave mentality within our minds: we "should" does not say why, but has the underlying child-fearing "because I said so," without any respect to ourselves, our thoughts, our needs, and our ability to make decisions based on our circumstances.
For example, let's say John's been going to college. It's getting close to the end of the week a difficult assignment is due, and John has only half finished it by the deadline. He manages to get it in a few days late, but is docked 20% on his grade because he missed the deadline. He thinks to himself: "I should've spent more time working on that assignment!"
If John simply neglected the assignment, we might think the same, but what if I told you that, in addition to college classes, John has been working 2 jobs to help support his family, his wife and 3 kids. He is also an Elder's Quorum President, and that week his wife got really sick and he was doing the housework and running his kids to school so his wife could stay home and recuperate. How reasonable does his statement sound? What if he said instead: "If I wanted to get the full grade, it would've been easier for me to turn it in on time if I had . . . " This change in language changes the feeling that we get about the situation. It helps us realize what the focus was and how to go about doing it, and it leaves us with a choice.
Even that statement, though, is still negative because it focuses on things outside our control: the past. What if he said instead: "This week, I had a lot going on. In the future, it might make it easier for me to turn an assignment like this on time if were to . . ."
The battle over agency that we fought for in heaven is still going on today. We see it more obviously in those who seek to exercise unrighteous dominion over others, but it is there in our everyday lives as Satan strives to make us feel powerless and helpless over our circumstances. As we strive to recognize how we can make our own decisions, how we can be agents unto ourselves by making decisions based on righteous priorities, we begin to see how much power God has given us in our lives. No one can choose the circumstances he is placed in, but every person can choose what to do with the trials, the struggles, and the circumstances God has placed us in for our growth, our edification, for our Salvation and Exaltation.
Let's strive to speak more kindly to each other, and especially to ourselves. Let's strive to speak in such a way that every person can feel that they have that unlimited potential to choose for themselves. Let's focus on what we can do and remember that God loves us and will not ever hold us responsible for those things that are outside our control.
Love you all, my friends!
This series and this thought were with me as a friend at work was unkind to another friend, a coworker. These two have butted heads a little, and I saw how when the they were unkind to each other, neither one of them was as happy afterwords, and it made me think back to this thought: when we serve the unmaker, we unmake things. This also made me think of the Savior who said: "No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon." (Matthew 6:24) When we serve God, we uplift others and strengthen them, And when we serve Satan, we tear them down and make their lives more difficult.
