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Adults with ADHD are highly critical of themselves and their achievements. 
If your inner voice is constantly telling you negative messages, this results in you feeling bad about yourself and results in low self esteem.
Often your inner voice talks to you in such a rude way, and you would never talk like that to any other human being.
In his book, The Untethered Soul’ Michael Singer says your inner voice is like your inner roommate.
I picture my inner roommate as someone who lounges around all day eating chips and not doing anything with their life, but is really happy to give negative running commentary on mine.
Thinking of your inner voice as slightly separate from you is helpful because it provides some distance.
Your negative inner voice isn’t accurate, but when you believe your negative thoughts, it affects how you feel e.g., blah, sad, bad about yourself, and your physical energy is low, sluggish and everything feels like a huge effort.
In my book, Untapped Brilliance, I share a story that helped me to understand the connections between my inner voice, mood and performance.
One sunny summer Sunday morning I was running with my running group.
Despite the beautiful day, I was running slower than usual, my legs felt heavy, my lungs hurt and I wasn’t enjoying myself at all. Then I noticed what my inner voice was saying.
- ‘You shouldn’t have stayed out so late last night.
- No wonder you are finding it so hard. You haven’t run for a whole week.
- And on and on.
It was making me miserable. I decided to drown out the negative voice with a positive one.
I started to say, ‘You are doing really well. You are doing really well.’
Even though I didn’t really believe I was doing really well, something amazing happened.
My body stopped hurting, my running speed increased and I really enjoyed the rest of the run.
We can only say one thing at once to ourselves, so by drowning out the negative inner voice with a positive message your mood, how you feel about yourself, your physical energy and ability ‘ to ‘do’ things increase +++.
Test it out for yourself!
We want your inner voice to be your biggest supporter. Be positive, encouraging, reassuring and congratulatory.
It’s impossible to catch everything you say to yourself as some thoughts are so fleeting. However when you are aware you have said something negative or mean to yourself, take a moment to counter it with a positive comment.
Gradually, you will find yourself speaking more kindly to yourself and this has positive ripple effect on how you feel about yourself and how you operate in the world on a daily basis.
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