How Your Self-Talk Quietly Shapes Your Future

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Today we're gonna be talking about one of the most important and powerful forces shaping your life right now, and most people barely even notice it And that is your self-talk. The inner conversation happening inside your mind every single day, the voice that speaks when things go wrong, the voice that speaks when you fail, the voice that speaks when you look in the mirror, the voice that speaks when you are trying to pursue something bigger for your life. Because long before people lose, in reality, they often lose internally first. So today is going to be everything around self-talk and how it actually affects your life. And, uh, if you can master the conversation happening within you, you can completely transform your life. We'll be sharing a little bit on how you can master that self-talk and actually use it in your favor. So let's jump right into it. We're gonna get started with some life hacks and fun facts. The very first life hack is change your environment, change your thoughts. Your environment feeds your internal dialogue. So negative people, chaotic spaces, doom scrolling, constant bad news, toxic conversations all become a part of your mental programming. Protect your mental environment like your future depends on it Because it actually does. And you guys oftentimes hear me talk about how you have to engineer your environment. You have to create a winner's world for yourself, where every single day the environment that you're in is actually helping you on whatever it is that you're looking to do, whether if you're pursuing a specific goal or you have a dream in mind, ask yourself,"Is this environment most conducive for bringing that into a reality?" From, you know, the cleanliness of your home to your workspace, how organized it is, the, the feng shui, if you will. And, uh, I oftentimes mention how a cluttered home is a cluttered mind, a cluttered mind is a cluttered life. So your outer world will always be a direct reflection of your inner world. Your environment is super, super important. But not even just when it comes to your personal living space, it's also the company that you keep. It's also just what you're tuning into every single day. As you oftentimes hear us say,"Garbage in, garbage out, greatness, gr- greatness in, greatness out." So the news that you consume, the information, the content you consume is all a big part of that. Now, life hack number two: talk to yourself like someone you are responsible for. Most people speak to themselves worse than they would speak to a stranger. I love the saying from What to Say When You Talk to Yourself, the book by Dr. Shad Helmstetter. He says,"You never wanna say something about yourself that you don't want to be true." So oftentimes we get caught up in just speaking really bad about ourselves, and ask yourself, like, would you speak to a child like that? Maybe, maybe you will. But, um, the biggest thing you have to be mindful of is the way that you speak to yourself, it really does become a self-fulfilling prophecy. You have to be very mindful of the language that you use, because language also dictates your emotional state. So when you're speaking things like, you know, I hear people oftentimes just mention, you know, how, uh, they're just, they're just so exhausted, right? Or they're, they're starving. We tend to dramatize what-- however we're feeling. And I mean, think about it. Some- sometimes you may just be a little bit tired or maybe even just a little bit hungry, but the way you describe your situation actually amplifies the feeling behind it. So language does really dictate the way that you feel in that present moment. So it is, is super, super important to always catch, you know, the way you speak to yourself. Now, most, uh, again, most people speak to themselves worse than they would speak to a stranger. So instead of saying, let's say,"I'm failing," try saying,"I'm learning, I'm adapting, I'm growing through this." Because again, language does shape your emotional state. Now, life hack number three is create evidence for confidence. Con- confidence doesn't just magically appear. It's built through small promises that you keep to yourself. So for example, it could be working out, waking up early, posting content, reading, making difficult calls. I always say to do at least one hard thing every single day. That one hard thing, actually, it helps you generate that momentum needed to do more hard things. It's like you get this, this surge of dopamine. Whenever you do something that's very difficult, it gives you this, this, this, this energy, this surge of, of dopamine that flows through you that, that gives you the motivation to do more things. And sometimes that hard thing, honestly, is just going to the gym for about 20 minutes. Maybe it's just even going for a walk. Maybe it's making that one phone call. Maybe it's answering those emails. But find something that you can do, um, and the smaller the better because sometimes if it's too hard, if it's too difficult, too much resistance, then that's the very thing that prevents us from doing it. But if you start off with something small, maybe it's hard in that moment, but it's not something that is going to take a whole bunch of time, that one little act could very well create the momentum needed to carry out the rest of your day. Now, every action sends a message to your subconscious, and that message is,"I trust myself. I trust myself." And if you can trust yourself with the little things, you definitely can trust yourself with the big things. Now, let's jump into some fun facts. Your, your brain has roughly, on the low end, 6,000, on the high end, 60,000 thoughts per day, depending on the study. A large percentage are repetitive. So think about that for a second. You have tens of thousands of thoughts every single day, and the vast majority of them are repetitive. So what exactly are you thinking, and how are your thoughts dictating your future? Okay? And, um, uh, many people are literally living in the same mental loop every single day. And Dr. Joe Dispenza, I remember hearing him say that you have to, uh, basically learn or unlearn or break the habit of, of being yourself. Because if y- by default, you're naturally thinking these negative thoughts... Is I, I had to tell my son the other day'cause I, I, I catch him sometimes being a little negative, and I have to remind him that he's being like a Johnny Raincloud, right? Like,"Don't be a Johnny Raincloud. If you're gonna be anything, right, just do not be a Johnny Raincloud type of person, a Debbie Downer type of person." That, that negative self-talk, it affects you so much, and you have to catch it in... Because if, if you don't, sometimes by default we fall into these patterns just because of programming over the years. Now, fun fact number two is the brain often cannot fully distinguish between vividly imagined experiences and real experiences. In short, it means it doesn't know the difference between what's real and what's not real, what's a truth and what's a lie. That's one reason why visualization can be so powerful for athletes, performers, and entrepreneurs. So what are you visualizing throughout the course of the day? Sometimes we have a habit of visualizing the very worst case scenarios, visualizing just... Or, or, uh, catastrophizing whatever it is that we're going through, or we make things just more than what they really are. And again, it's not only just the self-talk, it's also what are you visualizing, because oftentimes what you visuali- visualize is also dictating your emotional state at any given moment. Now, fun fact number three. Fun fact number three is your reticular activating system, the RAS, acts like a filter for reality. You guys hear me talk about the RAS all the time, and it's basically the part of your brain that filters out your predominant thoughts. So it's, it's wired. Let's say, for example, you're really passionate about real estate, and now you're getting into real estate, and all of a sudden you start seeing real estate opportunities everywhere. Now, did they just randomly appear now that you're into real estate? No. It's always been there. It's like if you got interested in a specific car, and now all of a sudden you see that car on the road all the time. It was always on the road. But the reticular activating system to basically preserve your brain power and all the energy that your brain produces, in order to preserve it, this RAS filters out all of the thoughts that aren't necessarily predominant thoughts, and that's the way it works. So once your brain believes that something is important, it starts noticing more of it. That's why people suddenly see opportunities after shifting their beliefs. This is really, really important to understand. Now- In our community, within our Dream Nation community, one of the things that, that we build a culture on is personal development. And one thing that I've learned about personal development is when you commit to just reading books or listening to positive podcasts or audios, or going to seminars, listening and tuning in to the thinking that's currently outthinking you, what tends to happen is your life starts to change because your mindset starts to change. You start to adopt the very thinking, again, that is outthinking you, the thinking of people who are succeeding at the highest levels. You start to adopt their, their perspective many times, and that's why it is very important to be mindful of what you're tuning into. Because if you're constantly tuning into people who are negative, it, it will rub off on you. It has this way of permeating into your mind. Now, let's jump into the main segment of today, which is your inner dialogue becomes your identity. Most people think identity is fixed, but it's not. Identity is reinforced through repeated internal language. I love the saying that your personality determines your personal reality, and your personality can very well be worked on. It isn't something that's just set in stone for the rest of your life. Think about how much you may have changed from your younger self to now. For those of you who are 40 plus, think about you at 20 and how much you've grown over the years. I was just telling my wife last night how there are moments where, and I'm not sure how many of you can relate to this, where you think back at some of the ways you probably handled certain things back in the day, and then you start to realize how toxic you really were and how much you've actually grown, how much you've healed. Like, when I genuine- I, I was thinking about the year I had coached my high school football team one year. I had redshirted one year in, in college when I was playing football, and pretty much when you redshirt, you take a year off, right? And you- sometimes you'll, you know, go a fifth year in college and play that year. But I had took, took a year off of, of college one year just because of everything I had going on at the moment. But what I did, uh, I played intramural football, flag football, uh, during that time, but I also coached my high school football team. And I remember, like, I was probably one of the worst coaches of all, in like, in all history. I mean, I-- maybe I'm exaggerating a little bit, but the reason why I say that is because I was toxic as hell. Like, I, I'd be ready to fight one of these players. Because in my mindset, it was like I had just graduated from high school, like two years ago, and you guys are, like, doing the most right now. And I would get all emotionally charged up, and now I would never do something like that. But- Sometimes you just, you grow over the years. You learn and you become less toxic as you heal, and it is important to understand that you can change your identity. You can very well work on it. You can work on your personality as well, right? So maybe you, you have a personality as someone who's very neurotic, and the reason why you're neurotic is because of all the trauma that you went through in your life. And when you heal, you become less and less neurotic. So that's, that's pretty much how it works, is, uh, you have to be mindful and aware of certain aspects of yourself that you wanna change, because awareness truly is the first step to healing. Now, think about this. When it comes to your identity, some people will say things like,"I'm always broke. Nothing ever works for me. I'm awkward. I never finish anything. I'm a procrastinator," things like that. And the subconscious absorbs repetition. It's, it's essential to under- understand that. It absorbs repetition, so the more you say these things about yourself, the more you reinforce them as true for you. Eventually, the mind begins protecting the identity it's most familiar with, even when that identity creates suffering. I remember my mentor, he would oftentimes say that one of the most powerful forces in the universe is the human being's personality's desire to be congruent with who it believes it is. So if you're gonna have any identity, at least have an identity that's useful for your life, an identity that brings you the most joy, that brings you the most peace. Next, we have the dangerous power of negative self-talk. The dangerous power of negative self-talk. This is actually one of the things that my wife and I are really big on in our household, is just always reminding our kids about the way they speak about themselves. Because even, even children, for example, children aren't naturally born negative, right? Children bubble with bliss, and they're very joyful, but society will program to be otherwise, and we, we oftentimes have to check them because they, they may be watching, let's say, TV shows or YouTube, and this is why it is very, very important to be mindful of what you allow your kids to watch, because they could very well take on these negative tendencies, whether it's because of their need for significance, right? Some kids will do that. They'll, they'll take on a certain personality because they learned it from... It's like learned behavior, and they'll do it for underlying reasons, but you have to catch it early, and you have to l- always remind them of that. It's, it's crazy because I remember when I first got started on my personal development journey- One of the things that was the most profound thing that I had learned, or one of the most profound things that I had learned in the early years was just this idea of self-talk. I had no idea until I read the book What to Say When You Talk to Yourself, I had no idea about my, my self-talk, no awareness of it. And when I finally became aware of it, like, things started to change for me. It's like the first time I remember reading The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, and he talked about living in the present moment. Up until that moment, I had never really thought about living in the present moment. I was always thinking about the future, always thinking about my dreams, my goals, but never was really in tune with the present moment. So that's why w- I always say awareness is the first step to healing. You have to be aware of the different aspects of yourself that aren't really working in your favor. Now, negative self-talk becomes emotional conditioning, and when people repeatedly attack themselves internally, confidence decreases, energy drops, action decreases, opportunities are avoided. Then reality starts reflecting the internal belief system, not because the universe hates them or God hates them, right? It's, it's b- because their nervous system starts acting in alignment with those beliefs. And, you know, I had to catch myself in recent years because as you go through, for example, business challenges as an entrepreneur, entrepreneurship... I mean, if you want a path of uncertainty, right? Like, embark on entrepreneurship. If you wanna learn how to navigate through uncertainty, you wanna learn how to just navigate through a compromised, uh, nervous system, like, go into entrepreneurship, because entrepreneurship, the very essence of it is taking risk, and sometimes you're taking risks and there's, there's no clear sight, right, that you have on your path. And you are navigating through the unknown, and you have to be mindful of the, the types of thoughts that you're, you're having because again, sometimes when things are very uncertain, we tend to catastrophize our, our, our situation or dramatize our situation. And there, there have been many moments over the last several years where I've had to catch myself, like, because you could feel it. You start getting stressed out. You think about worst-case scenarios, and you start worrying about what the future holds. And the thing about it is, for me, I've, I've learned that the, the best way to approach uncertainty is just to take life by the day. Just focus on winning the day. Focus on what's within the parameters of your control. Because if you start focusing on what's outside of your control, that's what affects your nervous system. And once your nervous system is compromised, you have no energy, you have no confidence. Your, your, your resourcefulness is at an all-time low. Your ability to think creatively and, and, and be resourceful is at an all-time low. So you have to always be mindful of that stinking thinking, that, that thinking that is essentially self-sabotaging you. Now, why does trauma often shape the inner voice? Many people inherit- inherited their inner voice. Think about how profound that is, how you can inherit your inner voice. And it's, it's interesting because I love the, the cartoon display of you have the angel on one shoulder and the demon on the other shoulder, and they're constantly whispering in your ear. And I, I, I, I love the American, uh, it's, it's like an Ame- a Native American, uh, proverb, and it goes something along the lines like this: Every single person has two wolves that they're constantly dealing with. They have the wolf of the light and the wolf of the dark. So think about it as the little angel and the little demon on your shoulders, right? And the Native American proverb states that the wolf that ultimately survives is the one that you feed the most. So if you constantly feed negativity, that's what's going to survive as your inner voice. If you starve the negativity and just feed the, the voice of the light, the, the, the, the wolf of the light, the wolf that is encouraging you, that is inspiring you, the, the wolf that is constantly empowering you, that's what's ultimately going to prevail. So you have to take control over that inner voice, because if you leave it to default... Remember, the human brain is not necessarily designed to keep you happy. The human brain has evolved to, to, to keep you alive. It's designed for survival. So when, when it comes down to survival, we have a natural tendency of looking at worst-case scenarios. Because think about it, thousands of years ago, if you were out in the wild, you had to think of all kinds of worst-case scenarios because that's what kept you alive. However, in modern-day times, we're no longer living these tribal lives out in the wild, and we tend to make things worse than they actually are. So it is, it is very, very important to just be mindful of whatever it is that you're going through Don't, don't look at it worse than what it is. Look at it as it is, but not worse than it is. Because again, your, your, your brain will naturally default to that. And, and that's what affects your nervous system, and your nervous system will ultimately affect your actions and h- and how much you, you, you produce, how, how much you contribute to getting yourself out of that situation, how much you contri- contribute to participating in your own rescue. Now, some people, again, still carry the emotional voices of childhood into adulthood. That's why healing matters, because sometimes the voice inside your head isn't even truly yours. How profound is that? Imagine the, the voice in your head... My, my wife and I were talking about this, uh, recently as well, where, you know, we, we genuinely believe that sometimes the, like, the voices in your head could have been passed down from generation to generation. So imagine if your great-great-grandparents were severely traumatized because of what they went through, and then those voices produced the, the very language that they used to raise their children, and then those children adopted the very thoughts and the ideas, the, the negative tendencies, those negative characteristics. This is what we talk about when, when you hear things like general- generational cycles or curses, whatever you wanna call it, right? These are things that get passed down through generations, but really it's generational trauma. It's generational trauma, and it takes for one generation to finally have the awareness of what's going on in the first place. And until that, that generation or that person has that awareness, that family can't truly heal because they're, they're constantly passing down this internal dialogue, right? So having a voice inside your head that isn't even truly yours. Have you ever had negative thinking? Like, when I think of the voice of the enemy, it's like a voice that is producing these thoughts in your mind, and have you ever had those moments where you had these thoughts and you're like,"I don't know who the hell's voice is that, but that damn sure ain't mine, because that ain't me. Like, I don't think like that," right? Uh, we, we all can relate to a point in time where we've had that in our lives, where we've had these, these destructive thoughts, and we know that these thoughts aren't us. In fact, none of your thoughts truly aren't you Your body, you are not your body and you are not your mind. You are a soul with a body and mind, but you are not your thoughts, and it is important to always have, have a, have an understanding of that. Don't, don't feel guilty because you have these negative thoughts. Thoughts just come and go. But you, you do have to be mindful of taking control over your thoughts because they can consume you. Next, we have reprogramming the mind. How do you reprogram the mind? Transformation requires conscious interruption, and this goes back to awareness. So awareness is the first thing. The next is catching destructive thoughts in the moment. When you start having those, those thoughts of worst-case scenario, the doomsday thoughts, the thoughts that are making you feel terrible, the thoughts that are sapping your motivation, right? You have to catch it in the moment. Reframing language. So rather than saying,"This is the worst thing in the world," what if you genuinely spoke life into your situation and you looked for the blessing in what it was that you were going through? You looked for the inspiring message in that mess. You looked for the treasure in that trash. What if, what if that's the way you reframed what it is that you're going through? Because isn't it true that we've all survived our very worst moments in life, our very darkest seasons? We've all survived them. And isn't it true that you always left with something of value, whether that's a greater appreciation of your life and what you have, whether it's wisdom, whether it's resilience? But the very darkest seasons always produce blessings, but only if you genuinely look for them. Another thing is changing emotional associations. How do you associate to what you're going through? That's a big thing. So I always talk about the emotion triad. The three main things that dictate your emotions are your physiology or your body, your focus, and your language, or the very meaning you give to what it is that you're going through. The meaning you give ultimately dictates how you feel about what it is that you're going through. So you can very well give the meaning of,"Life is happening to me," like everything is happening to me, and take on a victim mentality, or you could very well look at life as happening for you, where it's a mentality where everything that happens to you is meant to promote you. Everything that is happening to you will lead to something bigger and better, will lead you to your destiny. Another thing is exposing yourself to better environments. That's a big part of reprogramming your mind, exposing yourself to better environments, the content you consume, the conversations that you entertain, all of that stuff is a big part of it. So instead of saying,"My life is falling apart," for example, you can s- you can switch it to,"My life is restructuring me into something stronger." That shift alone changes emotional chemistry within you. The very language that you use. Again, the language is a part of the meaning that you give to what it is that you're going through. Next, we have the relationship between thoughts and actions. By the way, if you are getting value so far, drop a V for value. And quick pit stop for this month, I am offering 20 complimentary coaching sessions. I know some of you who didn't tune in last week, uh, didn't agai- get a chance to hear about the, the, the coaching sessions, and this is always my gift to our community. So if you're hopping on and you can use just an ear to listen, you need some guidance, you need some advice on whether it's your career, if you wanna get into, um, entrepreneurship or business, anything like that, or you're just navigating through a very challenging season, and you can use some personal coaching, take advantage of it. If you've never done the coaching, I've coached hundreds of people within our community over the years, uh, complimentary, no charge or anything like that, and it's been such a blessing, uh, just paying it forward back to you guys and also just connecting with you guys. It's always, always a joy to, to connect with a lot of you guys one-on-one and get to know you a lot better. Um, I love engaging with our community. Uh, that's why I always say, like, you know, I appreciate the comments. I always, you know, read through all of our comments, and I just love connecting with you guys on a deeper level. So, uh, if you would like my, my booking calendar, uh, just DM me the word coach, or I'll drop my Calendly link somewhere in the comments or the, the description directly after this. So just hop back on, and you should see it on YouTube, all of that good stuff. Make sure you also subscribe to the YouTube channel. Uh, it's definitely appreciated, and it'll help you, uh, get the notifications and all that stuff whenever I do go live here on The Breakfast Club. Moving forward, the relationship between thoughts and action. Now, thoughts influence, again, your confidence, energy, risk-taking, resilience, and consistency. People who believe differently behave differently, and behavior repeated long enough becomes destiny. That's a big, big part of it. And, and, um, imagine if you can get to a place in your life- Where you treat your mind like this beautiful garden. I remember learning this, this piece of wisdom where your, your, your mind, you have to treat it like a beautiful fertile garden, and you have to water it. And sometimes gardens produce weeds, and you have to be intentional about pulling the weeds from that garden and genuinely nurturing that garden because your mind is your most powerful weapon that you'll ever have in this lifetime. But we oftentimes neglect our mind. We don't really take the time to think about how we can nurture our mind almost as if it was this precious, sacred garden. What if you treated your mind like that? What if you were just kinder to yourself, more compassionate to yourself, and you were intentional about what you allow your mind to, to consume? I love what Jim Rohn, you guys hear me talk about, uh, talk about it all the time, what he shares about you have to stand like a little guard at the doorway of your mind, protecting it from the negativity of the world. That's how you have to go about your mindset and what you allow your mind to take in. Next, we have the future version of you. So I've been talking a lot in this series of the Journey podcasts and the last few Breakfast Club sessions, I've been talking a lot about the future version of yourself and how to, again, break the habit of being yourself or the older version of you that you really want to improve. And one of the most powerful questions you could ask is, what would the future version of you sound like internally? What would the future version of you sound like internally? This is the power of affirmations because affirmations, you're a lot more intentional about w- what you are speaking, right? You're, you're, you're a lot more intentional about speaking life into yourself, into your situation, and it, it is really great to have affirmations that you can constantly repeat to yourself on a day-to-day basis. And you can very well have those affirmations. Back in the day, we would, uh, write these Post-It notes, and we'd put it on the mirror where we brush our teeth. And I would recommend you guys take that approach if you n- if you really need to water the garden of your mind and nurture it in the right way, and you've been struggling with your mental health You, you have to take the time to, to intentionally speak life into your situation. Maybe you can do some mirror work. In the world of personal development, there's this concept of mirror work where you're just speaking life into yourself. Right in the mirror, you look yourself in the eyes, and you just start speaking life into yourself, into your situation, and you'd be amazed at how profound, uh, this, this, this can be in your life, how much it actually can affect you in a, in a very positive way. So what would the future version of you sound like internally? Would they constantly panic? Would they self-attack? Would they doubt themselves? Would they speak hopelessly? Or would you stay grounded, think strategically, speak with faith, encourage yourself through the hard seasons? What would that sound like, the very highest, best version of you? Because the future version of you starts with future language. You have to start with the language, and it's the one thing that you genuinely can take control over, but you have to have the awareness of it. Now, the, the analogy is the mind is like soil. Again, think of it like a, like a fertile garden, and whatever gets planted repeatedly eventually grows. Fear grows, confidence grows, scarcity grows, abundance grows. The question is, what are you watering every single day? What are you watering? What are you filling your mind with? Is it, is it thoughts of confidence? Is it thoughts of empowerment? Is it thoughts that lead to more faith? Or is it thoughts that are leading to more self-sabotage? Be very, very mindful of the language, and never say something about yourself that you genuinely don't want to be true, because words have power, okay? Now, as we get ready to close out, be careful how you speak to yourself during difficult seasons because your mind is always listening. Your inner conversation is either building your future or quietly destroying it, and sometimes the breakthrough People are searching for externally starts internally first. So my call to action to you is, uh, first and foremost, if today's Breakfast Club session resonated with you, if you know someone who can get value, definitely, like, you know, like, comment, share, tag someone who can get value or, or share it with someone who's battling right now, you know, with their mental health, battling internally, right? And if you haven't already, uh, make sure you subscribe to the podcast, The Journey Podcast with Josh Valentin, uh, for more conversations like this. And, uh, you know, if you're looking to grow yourself mentally, emotionally, spiritually, financially, all that good stuff, then you're definitely at the right place. And the last thing is, as we wrap up here, keep evolving, keep building, and never underestimate the power of the voice inside your own mind. You wanna take back control over your life, take control over that inner voice, and things will start to change for you. Ladies and gentlemen, breakfast is officially served. God bless every last one of you. I'll be seeing you all next week. Appreciate your time, and, uh, till next time, guys. Take care.