negative self-talk baloney

A few days ago I listed a bunch of negative things I noticed that I said to myself.  Well, since then I added about 15 more!  And each one I reframed.  One of them was this:

If I don't eat at restaurants when I'm on vacation, how will I get to know other people?  I'm always interested to meet new people in different places.

My reframing was:  since when do I make new friends in restaurants?   Maybe that could happen occasionally but not most of the time.  My mountain biking and kayaking hobbies take me off the beaten path and usually involve conversations with other people from the local area.

I've had a few experiences on my current vacation that demonstrate there are other ways to meet new people in different places than in restaurants.  First, yesterday in Whole Foods I had a lovely conversation with the college student who checked my groceries.  She told me all about her interest in how the indigenous Chinese are reacting to domestic tourism.  Boy did I learn a lot!   Today was an awesome experience though.  I was riding my mountain bike on a trail and realized I was going in the wrong direction when I met up with a guy at an intersection.  We got into one of the most enjoyable conversations of my life.  He was like a sage to me.  Okay, this is just one of those right place in the right times kind of things, but he is wiser than me in things I'm very interested in, and I got some of the best advice I've ever gotten.  One thing he said was, he tries not to define who he is because it limits who he can be.  An example he gave is some recent songs he wrote that are completely out of character for him---because he had defined a character for himself.   And when he writes songs, he doesn't know where it will take him--I find that with my writing too.  And he had lots of wise meditation advice.  He sang me a song inspired by meditation.  Then we said goodbye and headed off in our respective directions.  Then later on I came to another intersection where a difficult trail went off from.  I asked the two guys there how hard it is, and got into another very fun conversation.  I just really liked these guys--I'm kind of sad I'll probably never see them again.  I saw them two times later (they checked up on me after I did the difficult loop and then later on at the parking lot).  We had a hard time stopping our conversation each time.  They also gave me lots of tips on mountain biking and kayaking.  It was so fun.  That reminds me of another time I was riding near Amarillo, TX in a cool canyon and ended up riding with these three guys and had lots of fun.  These were guys I probably wouldn't have normally interacted with in daily life.  We probably have different politics, religion, all that labeling stuff.

Well, this is probably a bit off-topic, healthwise, but it shows that my negativity was uncalled for---why it's good to monitor your thoughts!

more on self-esteem

Jasmine asked me how I'm working on my self-esteem.  Well, given that it's only been a few days since my revelation that it's a serious problem, it may be premature to post about it.  But what the heck.  Here is what I'm doing:

• monitoring my thoughts to find out what my negative thoughts are.  This is not as easy as it sounds.  Meditation is a good way to learn to do this.  It teaches you how to be aware of your thoughts. 
• reframing my thoughts.  This was easy and fun for me.  You just have to make sure you believe your reframing.  
• practice my reframing.  This takes remembering but is reasonably fun since it's positive.
• Regarding healthy eating and weight loss, I don't know if this will work but I'm going to try this:   be happy with myself when I do well, and to refuse to be unhappy with myself when I'm not perfect.  

The last one might need some explanation:   The brain likes to do the opposite of what we tell it.  You discover this in meditation too.  My teachers play these games telling us to meditate on this and that, and we we constantly find that our brain does the opposite of what we tell it, it does what we tell it to avoid.  In fact, we are told the best way to meditate is to "not meditate."  Same with mountain biking--when you focus on the obstacle, you will hit it.  Focus on the path you want to take.  When you worry you will ride off the bridge, you will.  Focus on the center line of the bridge (the bridges are sometimes narrow).    So this is all to say, it's not easy to lose weight--otherwise the vast majority of people would not be overweight.  So refuse to be hard on yourself when you stumble.  otherwise, you will probably stumble more.   You'll head towards the obstacles instead of the path you want to go.

My Revelation

I'm on vacation, not much time to post tonight, but I wanted to share my revelation, especially after last week's negativity.   First a little background:  1) This year's project is learning meditation, and 2) I have low self-esteem.  Item #2 is the cause of my problem that has revealed itself, and item #1 helped me find it.  So I've been practicing meditation following this curriculum, going to a weekly class, and a workshop last weekend.  The goal is pretty simple, to learn to be aware of your thoughts.   That's it.  So last night while doing my food prep, I paid attention to my thoughts.  This is what I heard coming from my mind:  "I'm so weird for making these salads in my hotel room.  I'm an extremist.  I have taken this too far. I probably have an eating disorder.  If anyone saw me doing this, they would think I'm crazy."   Holy cow, I thought, do we have any positive thoughts to share?  silence.   Then today I monitored some more and heard more self-critical thoughts related to healthy eating.  I then explored old favorites.  Here are a bunch I came up with:

• I am no better than anyone else
  • (therefore) I don't deserve to feel good about myself for eating healthy [what???]
• people must think I'm weird (work lunches, business travel in bars and restaurants)
• I wish I could join in in the fun (beer, popcorn, ice cream at terrace, popcorn at movies, etc)
• (when delicious SAD treats are available that I used to love):  I want some but I can't have any.  I'm in nutritarian prison.
• my foodie friends may not want to be friends with me anymore
• I wish I could eat that
• I'm a weirdo and extremist for preparing salads in my hotel room.  

Now to reframe these negative thoughts:

• considering all the negative messages I've given myself, I've done incredibly well at sticking to my guns
• I'm passionate
• I'm a trailblazer
• I have discovered the secret to health and long life
• I'm smart for figuring this out
• not only to do I know what to do, I am doing it
• I am successful at eating healthy in an unhealthy world
• I deserve credit for my success, I deserve to compliment myself occasionally
• I am proud of what I'm doing
• I have nothing to apologize for
• I enjoy preparing salads in my hotel room, and I enjoy even more eating the food I prepare
• (while traveling, parties, restaurants:)  I'm proud of how I eat; I have no reason to apologize, my food tastes better and is better for me.  It's a free country!  
• (when delicious SAD treats are available that I used to love): I want some but I can't have any.  well, I don't really want it because I'll feel like crap if I eat it.  it's a pretty minor thing to give up for feeling good every day.   what else do I want to do?  mountain bike and kayak. permission granted! 
• If I had to eat SAD food every day, THEN I would be in SAD prison
• what are people's most common new year's resolutions?  eat better and lose weight.  so why am I weird for doing that?
• my foodie friends appear to still enjoy my company
• thank goodness I don't have to eat that
• (regarding food prep in the hotel room):  I'm the world's greatest nutritarian road warrior!

I'll probably edit this to make it more readable, just wanted to get it down.  You might ask why do I have such low self-esteem around this?  Well, I'm prone to it in all areas of my life, but in other areas I have external messages and rewards that make it more difficult to convince myself that I'm worthless.  For example, I'm pretty successful at work.  That doesn't stop me from thinking I'm all washed up and it's downhill from here and I'm a fraud.  But, there is ample evidence that I have been successful in the past and I can't argue with it.  With the healthy eating, I have evidence that my health is vastly improved and I'm at my ideal weight.  You'd think that would be enough to give me some confidence, huh?   Holy cow.  I just let the negative internal voice get out of hand.  I'm going to have to practice the appropriate responses to my negative voice.  

And in case you are wondering, I know why I have low self-esteem.  I won't go into it but the solution is to be aware of it and catch it in the act and recognize how irrational it is.

If you are like me at all, pay attention to your thoughts!    

Okay, time to plan tomorrow's fun!