Dr. Karol Darsa (trauma psychologist, founder of Reconnect Trauma Treatment Center) explains why many people engage in frequent negative self-talk, illustrates common statements and their harms (depression, anxiety, low self-esteem), and offers clinician-guided exercises to change it. She emphasizes first increasing awareness (recording every negative self-statement and tracing its origins, often parental), then dialoguing with the "inner critic" (empty-chair or journal conversation) to discover its perceived function, and finally making gradual language shifts (neutralizing statements, treating yourself like a friend, catching positive actions, gratitude journaling) while addressing perfectionism. The talk blends clinical rationale, a stepwise homework plan, and supportive encouragement.
Chapters
Hi, I'm Dr. Carol Darca, author, trauma psychologist and founder of Reconnect Trauma Treatment center in Los Angeles. How do you talk to yourself? Because I'm fascinated about the negative self talk that happens. I can't tell you how many times the clients that come in through my doors, I don't think I've ever met like a single person that didn't tell me how negatively they talk to themselves about themselves. In fact, one of my questions is usually how do you treat yourself? What kind of things you say to yourself? So I make quite of a passion about really helping people about this. So I decided to talk about it today as well with you. You know, we all talk to each to ourselves. Of course that doesn't mean we are crazy, right? But I'm more interested not just in general of like, oh, I can't do this kind of thing, but like really when it becomes a huge problem of saying very detrimental, very judgmental things to ourselves. So here are some sentences I'm. Well, for instance, if you actually just say, I'm not good at this, I probably shouldn't do this, that's okay, that sounds grounded, that sounds reasonable. But if you're saying something like I'm too lazy, why bother? I never even have time. I suck at this. Nothing ever goes right for me. I'm fat, I'm lazy, I'm ugly, I'm whatever. You can fill in the blank, right? So you could, you could hear the judgment, you can hear the, the damaging attitude towards yourself. So when is that too much? It's when it's said very frequently, ongoingly, and when you really believe it. So not just like once in a blue moon, but when it becomes a habit for you, why is that so bad? Well, actually a lot of people don't realize, but when this becomes a chronic habit, it can cause depression, it can cause anxiety, it can cause a lot of sort of low self esteem or hopelessness even in life. Just imagine if you had a friend living with you every day. He or she says these type of things to you. Well, instead of a friend, of course, you might have yourself doing that. So this is, we're going to tackle that topic a little bit and I want to be able to help you guys about what to do. Okay, I'm reading not from my computer because I don't want to forget some things that are very important. So here's a famous quote by Mahatma Gandhi. He your beliefs become your thoughts, your thoughts become your words and your words become your actions. So when people say, oh it's not so important what I say. The words, they have no meaning. That is not true. Every thought, every word has an energy. So if you're talking negatively to yourself, then that's what you will be hearing all the time. Where do you think that's coming from? I actually would like to first explore with clients. And you can do this with yourself. Why? Where did I learn to talk to myself that way? And of course, as you know, if you've seen any of my videos, until today, I'm a trauma psychologist, which means I am going to ask about how you were raised, what kind of parenting you had, and what kind of environment you grew up in. Because I want to know if you learned these negative judgments from someone else. In fact, one of the best way to find that out is an exercise I give when I first meet someone is that take at least two, three hours in, in the day, or maybe even your whole day, and write down every negative statement that you say to yourself from the very beginning. So you wake up. Let's see, maybe when you wake up first you said, ugh, look at my face, I look ugly. Look at my hair. Boom. Write it down. Throughout the day when you're at work, things that catch your attention. If you're a parent, maybe you didn't like your parenting style or you didn't like how you treated your husband or wife. Write it all down. Okay. At the end, take that piece of paper. Let's say you have 20 items. It could be, believe it or not, look at them and see if you've heard any of these statements said to you by someone else. So write the name next to it. So let's say the first one is you. Your face looks so ugly. Oh, yep, My mom used to say that. And you're seeing you're lazy. Oh, my dad used to say that. So see if you can catch up. Sorry. Match them up, see if there's any similarities between what you're saying and what you heard as a child. So we're starting first, basically with awareness, right? Because some people are not even aware that they're talking to themselves so negatively. And with that awareness, there's no change. So we're going to start there. I'm a big fan of making changes slowly. So please do not expect things to happen very fast. Right? We're going to become aware, we're going to write certain things down and then we're going to talk about other steps. I know most people who talk about self negative judgments talk about how to change them into positive Statements. And yes, we can do that. And I am going to briefly mention. But before I get there, I think it's more important to understand something else, which is finding why you're saying these to yourself. Not just because where it's coming from, but it's to find out if it actually has a function or if it actually has a purpose. So now you might really be surprised to hear that. But here's a way to find that out. So you're going to do something that I talked about in my other videos, which is called empty chair technique. So what I want you to do is I want you to take a chair in front of you, okay? And name that part of you that's saying all these negative things. Your inner critic, I don't know, your inner judge, the bad guy, whatever you want to call that part. Okay? You're going to sit in this chair, so this is me. And in the other chair, you're going to have that critic and then sit in that chair of the critic and say, read that list all in one, in five minutes, everything that you, you said to yourself throughout the day, okay? And then sit back in this chair where I'm sitting, right, you yourself, and ask, why are you telling me all these things? What is your purpose? So actually asking that question could give you a lot of information. So you're asking, what is the purpose of why you're telling me all of this? Who are you imitating? Who are you being like, right, did you hear these statements from anyone? And do you need something from me? So now I know this might sound a bit off. Like, why would you say to your critic, like, do you need something from me? While you're the one who probably needs not to be criticized. But you might be surprised that your inner critic might have actually a job that he or she thinks is doing right? Often people find that it could be because it's motivating, right? They think if I talk to you like this way, you're no good, then you'll get motivated or other reasons you'll have to find out. So get into this kind of a conversation, and the more you understand what's happening with that inner critic part of you, the more you'll be able to actually have a negotiation. So if he or she is trying to motivate you, see if you can get motivation in a different way, if this part of you is trying to protect you from maybe being hurt or from other things, see if you can achieve that goal in a more healthy way so that you don't Resort to this kind of negative judgments. So this is the part that it requires a little bit time. You could do this with an empty chair. Or if you don't want to do that, you think it sounds too strange, you can do this in a journal form. So you can basically have a dialogue, right? Just like in a screenplay, two different people talking and see what you find out. Again, I'd be very curious to know if you find this tool helpful. So please put some notes right below and let me know. So after you do that, here's how you're going to make the change gradually. Do not expect a negative self talk the next day to become all of a sudden, oh, I love you so much kind of thing. Before you get there, you want to first maybe change into neutrality, right? So it's like you are so whatever, so bad. And then maybe it's okay. And then eventually we're looking into maybe coming up with some positive statements. So please be realistic and make small changes. Think of yourself. Treat yourself as you would treat a friend. So again, take your list. If you would say this to a friend, do you think your friend would still be your friend? Probably no. And would you say, would you let actually a friend tell you all of these things? Probably. Also the answer is no. So maybe put yourself in the position of a friend and see if you can actually change your language. This reminds me when I was younger and I was judging myself for something and my best friend was judging herself for the same thing. And then we looked at each other, we're like, what? No, you're not that way. No, you're not that way. Why are we being so harsh on ourselves? And it was sort of. We just started really changing our language, thinking of each other and going, oh my God, I'm so much more forgiving and accepting of you than I am of myself. So that way of seeing it actually helped both of us to change our negative judgments. We tend to be so much nicer to other people than to ourselves. I don't know if you've heard people saying like, I'm sometimes my worst enemy. That's, that's a lot of the times what people talk about. So be careful, catch yourself being good. Catch yourself doing something good. And like maybe write that down, right? If you're saying all the time how unsuccessful you are or how fat you are or how this you are. See if you can say one positive thing and then maybe write it down. Something about writing it down and reading it again and again could actually be much more empowering than just keeping it in your head. And just also explore your perfectionism if you have such tendencies, and see if you can move towards being imperfect. Because a lot of this critic sort of this judgment attitude comes really from our tendency to be perfectionist, which is unfortunately a form of self abuse. Right? Because we, again, tend to be so harsh on ourselves. And last thing is, maybe write in a gratitude journal. Just sort of become aware of what you are thankful about life, but also what you are thankful for who you are, and for what you have done so far. Thank you for watching my video. Again, if you have questions questions, or if you have other topics you want me to cover in the next videos, write below and I'll be more than happy to address that. And remember, trauma equals disconnect. Healing equals reconnect. Stay connected.
