About a year ago I started talking to myself out loud. Just a little bit. Like maybe when I first woke up, or while I was walking to work or running in the woods. Although I have been hesitant to admit this, it has become an increasingly regular practice for me, this talking out loud to myself thing. I am coming out as THAT person, then, the one you see bopping down the road, lips moving. “Must be on the phone,” you think. Or, “probably singing along to some music in the ol’ ear buds.” That’s what we hope because there’s something unnerving about a person talking out loud to themself. In fact, such behavior on its own, is enough to get an individual categorized as mentally unstable. And if I were brown, black, or visibly poor, this one eccentricity could lead to a dangerous encounter with the police. Unless you’re a little kid, going around talking to yourself in contemporary Western society signifies a basic lack of self-control, a gross violation of white, bourgeois social norms. This “rule” is especially perverse since most people, it seems, don’t just talk to themselves, they do it incessantly, compulsively, barely ever coming up for air. For the most part, though, we all know better than to do it out loud.
In spiritual circles, this relentless, nattering voice in the head is often characterized as an enemy. Although it may be referred to in more playful terms as a “chattering monkey mind,” it’s generally understood to represent the ego, the supposedly benighted aspect of ourself that, at best, is innocently lost in illusion and, at worst, is deliberately trying to keep us from knowledge of our true self, that is, from awakening. Sometimes the voice is described as if it were a whole separate person, say, a godawful roommate to whom we have ceded rent-free occupancy, one whose recriminations, “helpful” advice and commentary lead to a state of chronic misery for many. There it is constantly berating or questioning us, reminding us of our supposed mistakes and deficiencies, warning us like the neurotic bigmouth that it is of absolutely everything that could possibly go wrong. And, of course, sometimes this asshole is actually made audible through our vocal cords and lips. Our toes smack into the bed frame and, almost as a reflex, we say, “idiot!” Or maybe we push send on the wrong email and let loose with a vocalized, “How could you be so stupid?!”
But it isn’t just negative self-talk that—for very good reason—is regarded with suspicion in spiritual contexts, but also supposedly positive, inflating talk, again, be it silent or vocalized. These are the bits of cheerleading we give ourself from time to time. This can range from positive feedback at the mirror on a good hair day to elaborate self-commentary about what an awesomely grateful person we are, or how much better we are psychologically or spiritually than, you know, those other poor schmoes. While affirmative self-talk is surely preferable to the negative grind down—a sneaky bastard that often wears the guise of self-improvement—it’s no more an expression of our deepest self than is the negative chatter. From a more metaphysical point of view, self-talk of whatever sort is relatively superficial. All of it is, to one degree or another, an expression of our egoic monkey mind, even if sometimes that restless little guy is more likable than others.
That last bit can be bitter pill for folks who are invested in positive thinking or manifestation frameworks. It can be a tough one, really, for any of us when we’re into believing that we can sort of control reality—at least “our” reality—by thinking the “right” thoughts. You know, that our lives would be great if only we could take a firm grip on the reins of that negative internal voice. And, to be honest, I don’t see how anyone can deny the power of positive self talk as an incredibly helpful coping strategy. Listening to an inner voice that tells me I’m smart, pretty, and funny, that I deserve to be promoted or asked to the dance, is so much more pleasant—and potentially constructive—than hearing I’m a piece of shit who deserves the shit circumstances of my shitty life. For anyone who sees the choice as being between these two poles of inner discourses, there is simply no contest. Positive self-talk—especially if one can avoid sliding into cheap, egomaniacal self-aggrandizement—wins every time.
What is often forgotten though is that this is not the full range of choice. Critically, there is also the option of taking a step back and away from the inner voice altogether, of taking a perspective from which to study and, eventually, become intimate with it in all of its permutations: “positive,” “negative,” or “neutral.” The transcendent spiritual-metaphysical step back and away is the key to disidentifying from the voice altogether. It’s a maneuver that can be utterly transformative for it is experiential proof that, not only is that nasty, negative voice not me, but the voice is not me period. This is when the really interesting spiritual work can begin. It’s an invitation to move beyond strategies of (sort of) managing or coping with one’s feelings and life circumstances to deeply transforming one’s entire “inner” and “outer” experience.
With this in mind, it’s clearer why it’s easy to both over and under estimate the power of practices such as talk therapy and journal-writing which, in psychological circles, are often vaunted as spaces to express one’s “true” feelings and, thereby, gain access to one’s “true self.” But, as someone who’s done both—I’ve kept a journal pretty consistently since I was a kid—I can see that my “I-voice” has, for the most part, been relatively neurotic and scattered. For instance, looking back through my yellowed spiral notebooks or old Word files, I find litanies of self-obsession ranging from extremes of anxiety and self-doubt to the kind of you-go-girl! cheerleading sessions I describe above. My “I-voice” exercises have, then, been a pretty accurate mirror of the yammering, positive-negative voice in my head. Where talk therapy and journal-writing have been truly helpful for me—and, wow, they have been—here’s why: Giving objective form to such thoughts, getting them out of my head and “out there,” has helped reveal them as not-me, not-me, not-me. Far from expressing the truly true truth of my deepest being, then, externalizing my thoughts/feelings has helped me recognize that my mentalizing (and sentimentalizing) isn’t really me at all. To the contrary, I am revealed to myself as the one who is aware of such thoughts and feelings and this is a fucking game-changer.
That said, I can now return to the this weird thing I did this morning, pacing around the house, forgotten coffee cup cooling in my left hand, gesturing with my right as, yes, I talked to myself out loud. But despite the familiarity of the voice I heard, I was not speaking as “myself.” This voice arose, instead, from a space of empty openness to whatever thoughts might want to take shape first as neurochemicals, and then as vibrations in the air between my lips and ears. I have no idea where the thoughts came from, but I do notice that, when I am relaxed and undefended, it is clear that they are not “mine” and certainly not “me.” And so I am increasingly able to welcome them. With wonder and surprise, or maybe with a flash of disgust or discomfort, but, less and less, with a sense of attachment or ownership. Although it would appear to an onlooker that I am “talking to myself,” then, I am not. Not really. But nor am I conversing with a separate interlocutor. I am, rather, dancing with the externalization of thought itself. And so I can laugh at its frequent missteps, including its spates of self-pity or efforts to gin up some narcissistic drama. But I can also notice the occasional grace of its maneuvers—its elegant dips, pivots and reverse spins. And once in a while I am moved to silent awe at its sparks of brilliance as it moves through me on its way to wherever it is going next.
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