Imagine you are walking down the street and see someone walking alone talking to themselves, you’d probably try to avoid them. Talking to oneself can be associated with eccentricity or mental instability. Yet, the truth is we all talk to ourselves.
Like most people, you probably have an inner dialogue that is constantly running. Your self-talk has a tremendous influence on our physical, emotional, and mental well-being. Yet, we often disregard it or at least underestimate its impact.
For many of us, this constant inner dialogue has a critical tone. If we try to suppress it, it only gets stronger. In my new book on Mirror Meditation, I share the research findings on using the mirror to leverage the power of self-talk to increase your self-compassion, confidence and social presence.
In the first step to making your self-talk more compassionate, you become aware of the content and emotional tone of their internal dialogue when you face setbacks. Then you can try to intentionally make your self-talk more compassionate, encouraging, and non-judgmentally accepting. Creating these compassionate self-statements after self-criticism has been found to increase positive feelings, without undermining people’s willingness to accept responsibility for their negative actions.
Can the mirror amplify the effects of compassionate self-talk? YES!
Mirrors have the capacity to increase our self-awareness and self-focused attention. So, if you’re self-critical and you look in the mirror – it’s likely to amplify your criticism. In teaching mirror meditation, I am often struck by how unkind people can be to themselves when they first look in the mirror. The mirror tends to magnify our internal state and looking at yourself without a clear intention often evokes self-critical inner dialogue as a default.
So maybe your first instinct is just to avoid looking in the mirror when you are feeling self-critical. I want to encourage you to do the opposite!
Take a good look in the mirror when you are feeling self-critical. Here’s why:
The mirror has been proven to be a useful therapeutic tool for compassionate self-talk.
A research study, detailed in my book, was conducted a study to test whether a mirror could enhance the efficacy of compassionate self-talk. The research participants were asked to generate four phrases they would use to soothe and encourage their best friend. Then they were asked describe an episode in which they criticized themselves and were assigned to one of three conditions: (1) to repeat the four phrases to themselves while looking at the mirror; or (2) repeat the four phrases to themselves without the mirror; or (3) look at themselves in the mirror without repeating the phrases.
Here are some examples of compassion phrases:
- The parts of yourself that you don’t like are parts of you that need your attention and love.
- You’ve been strong in the past, and you will be able to find your strength now too.
- I’m here and I will be here forever; I’ll always try to help you in any way possible.
- Think about all the positive things that you did and will do.
The results of the study showed that participants who said the phrases in the mirror reported higher levels of soothing positive emotions. So it appears the mirror does boost the soothing effects of compassionate self-talk.
Try it for yourself.
Make a list of positive, soothing, compassionate phrases or sentences that you would say to comfort a beloved friend, or those phrases and sentences that you’d most like to hear when you’re feeling upset or down. Have them handy and say them to yourself in the mirror when you need a boost in self-compassion. Then try saying these phrases to a loved one while looking into her or his eyes when the person needs some calming and reassurance.
And consider this: Before you begin your compassionate self-talk in the mirror, simply notice the general emotional tone that your reflection evokes in you as you look at yourself. And see if you can have compassion for your lack of compassion.
Copyright © 2022, Tara Well PhD
