I’m so excited to share this week’s topic because it’s especially applicable to the thousands of people who are going through the all-new Boot Camp 2.0 course right now. When you’re just starting Boot Camp for the first time, you’re learning a lot of new things, breaking a lot of bad habits, maybe breaking some addictions, and setting up new behaviors, which is all very willpower-depleting.
When your willpower is depleted—which is what happens until you make these new habits automatic—it can feel like the dial is turned up on life. Things just feel more intense, and challenges can feel more difficult. And that’s where this tool comes into play.
I’ve been reading the book Chatter: The Voice in Our Head, Why it Matters, and How to Harness it. The author, Ethan Kross, talks about how our internal voices work when it comes to challenging situations. Some people are “distancers,” and some are “immersers”—they get really immersed in the situation. You can see this in the “I” language used. For example, when someone posts on social media something like, “Every time I go to the mechanic I feel like I don’t know anything about cars. It always takes them a long time to serve me and I feel like my ignorance is visible to everyone. Why have I never learned the basics about how to take care of a car?” With self-talk, a lot of “I” language, reflects someone who is very emersed in their story and circumstance. Immersers tend to have higher levels of clinical depression. People who are more distanced generally tend to have more perspective and better mental health.
There are exercises that can help create that distancing effect. For example, think about the situation as if you are viewing it from another country, from far in the future, or from far in the past. This enables you to see situations as challenges rather than as threats. What’s difficult about this is that people in stressful, challenging situations have a hard time implementing this. When we feel threatened, our cognitive resources are tapped, and completing this perspective shift successfully takes a lot of mental effort.
An easier way to get this distance is to talk to yourself or about yourself in the second or third person. This is simple, and it’s fast. They’ve done brain-scan studies that show that it takes only 1 second for the brain to register this change and for it to impact the brain and the body.
For example, in the second person: “You can handle this, Susan. You’re a good mom. Your kid is having some big feelings right now, but you’re not going to get reactive, and you are going to help her through this, and you’ll do just fine.”
Another example, in the third person: “Susan is a good mom. She can handle this. She’ll manage this just fine. Her kid is going through something, but she’s got it under control.”
This is called illeism and has a long history. The author Ethan Kross stumbled on it by accident, as happens with many scientific insights. One of his research findings got a lot of publicity and he was on the news and got fan mail. But one person took offense to his findings and wrote him a death threat. This really affected him negatively. He was scared and paranoid, and he wasn’t sleeping. Finally, he said to himself, “Ethan this is crazy. What are you doing? This is probably nothing. You need to get back to your life.” He was finally able to sleep that night. Then he started noticing instances of other people using this type of language successfully.
The research supports this. Within one second, you will be calmer, able to make better decisions, and have perspective. Being able to see the situation as a challenge and not a threat, allows you to perform better and persevere. And you can implement this to help yourself to overcome, be resilient, and stay Bright—for one more moment, meal, or day. To do the things needed to set yourself up for success and create the habits that will establish your Bright life. Even when it’s hard—you can talk your way through it.
