Recalibrate Your Internal Voice

My wife does an amazing job working with our young son when she hears him talking negatively about himself.  She asks him “What is the most important voice we hear?” and patiently waits for him to answer, “Our own.”  Then she takes the time to walk him through what she heard him say, discusses positive replacement alternatives, and illustrates the impact of changing how he talks to himself.  

Our internal voice serves as our air traffic control.   In many ways it feeds our self-images, directs our attention, impacts the amount of effort we exert, and drives how we feel, act, and respond. It can be especially hard to recognize when our internal voice is misleading us because it is the same mechanism we use to justify our words, actions, and reactions.  

Successfully reframing our internal conversations typically involves three focus shifts.  The first is shifting our focus from the moment we are experiencing (or dreading), to the outcome we wish to achieve.  When we are trapped in the moment we often speak and act in a manner that we believe will address our immediate emotions.  Whereas focusing on the outcome gives us something worth achieving.  The more valuable we believe the outcome is, the more we will be willing to sacrifice, endure, and the easier it will be for us to justify changing our thoughts and behaviors to achieve it. 

The second is shifting our expectations.  Our expectations serve as our observation filter in two common ways.  The first is when we confirm a negative expectation. Such as expecting someone to argue with us and then watching them furrow their eyebrows as we speak.  Instead of recognizing that behavior could represent a number of different reactions, we immediately view it as confirmation of the impending argument we expected to encounter.  Second is when our counterpart’s behavior violates a positive expectation.  We expected them to agree to our idea and they disagreed.  Or we expected them to meet a deadline and they missed it.  Our reaction is driven more by the fact that they violated our expectations than the fact they disagreed or missed the deadline. 

Now that we are focused on outcomes, and we have elevated our expectations, we can shift our focus from what we want to experience to what our counterparts need to experience before they commit to achieving our preferred outcomes.  Prioritizing their needs allows us to frame our messages, and reactions, in a manner that encourages them to align what we want them to do with their self-images. 

Examples of reframing negative internal statements to positive, outcome and counterpart orientated, statements include: 

• Shift from “They won’t listen” to “I need to capture their attention” 
• Shift from “They don’t care” to “I need to illustrate how this aligns with their objectives” 
• Shift from “They won’t understand” to “I need to help them understand” 
• Shift from “It will just be another argument” to “They will need to vent before they are ready to listen”  
• Shift from “They will just give me another excuse” to “They will need to save face before we can move forward” 
• Shift from “They won’t give me the time” to “I have to earn their time” 
• Shift from “They need to follow my plan” to “I need to demonstrate how this plan ends with their desired outcome” 
• Shift from “They completely ignored me” to “I didn’t make it clear enough” 
• Shift from “They are clearly playing games with me” to “I need to leverage their tactics to achieve my goals” 
• Shift from “I don’t have any leverage” to “I need to create the opportunity to influence them” 

Life is a series of solvable problems.  Focusing on the solution as opposed to the problem.  Allows CEO’s to create the experience their counterparts need to drive the business and relational outcomes they desire.  

Written by Michael Reddington.

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