The person we speak with the most, the person we listen to the most, the person whose advice we seek the most is much closer than we think.  It’s ourselves.  That voice follows us throughout our days, it guides our thoughts, our actions, it permeates our sleep, it allows us to day dream, it helps us plan.  The inner voice even helps us remember things.  Part of me was terrified to share this piece because there are a lot of things that run through my head.  The truth is, my mind isn’t the kindest place to be.  I’m incredibly hard on myself, I have extreme expectations, and I truly have a tendency to think of worst-case scenarios—logically I know it’s ridiculous, I know there is no chance of it happening, but I can’t seem to stop the thoughts from popping in. For example, my husband and son went out today and I had been feeling a little on edge before they left and the thought popped in my head that I was going to get a call that they had been killed.  I mean, that’s absolutely ridiculous. There is no in between in my brain—it’s either really positive or super negative. 

While it’s embarrassing to acknowledge how crazy it feels in my brain some days, I happened upon a meditation that spoke about the positive side of an inner voice and how we can channel it through encouraging reconsidering things.  The positive to an active mind is that there is limitless energy and creativity.  I mean, yes, the thoughts I have can be pretty macabre, but it takes a pretty imaginative person to get into those scenarios.  Active minds tend to run on their own, sometimes with multiple tracks all at the same time.  There are stories and ideas always floating around up there and when that can be channeled, it’s pretty cool.  If a mind is that creative, it needs an outlet.  We don’t have to sit and stew in our own fear or misery.  We can acknowledge it’s just a thought and we can use our thoughts in other ways.

A good step to this is to see the thoughts as they come and allow them to pass.  I actually love this one even though it isn’t natural to me yet and I don’t use it that often.  The idea of a thought floating through and being allowed to pass gives me a huge sense of relief because it seems like it would simply float away, unattached to anything.  Another way is to learn to talk to it.  This one I use quite a bit more.  When a truly far-fetched thought makes it’s way in my brain and feels a bit obsessive, I speak out loud with, “STOP!”  And then I take the inner dialogue and tell it that the thought is just a thought, the chances of it happening are almost zero.  I also like the technique of simply finding a flaw with the thought.  If we can logically see where we went wrong, that the thought has no ground, it’s easier to find another route of thinking.  We spend a lot of time in our heads, it’s important to remember that we have a say of what goes on in there.  Make it a nice place to be.