Auto Suggestion: The Principle of Replacing Your Itty Bitty Shitty Committee
We all have tapes running in our head, most of which were placed there by sources other than ourselves
I admit it, I've experienced a great deal of self-doubt in my life. Whenever I'm doing something, there's usually this nagging voice that's screaming at me, telling me I'm going to fail, explaining how all the people in my life will judge me and laugh at me for doing X.
It's frustrating as hell and can be a big impediment to success if you let it overtake your mindset. All of those negative voices have been the result of people in your life, who mostly planted these thoughts and ideas in your head without either you are them knowing it was happening.
In fact, most of their unconscious programs that they've passed on to you were given to them by people in their lives. Once internalized, that voice of your negative aunt, your cynical brother, or that asshole teacher who never believed in you BECOME YOU. When you believe the program, it doesn't matter if all of the sources of the mental program are dead and gone, it will play for an eternity.
The Itty-Bitty-Shitty Committee
I had a conversation with a friend of my mother many years ago, as I was discussing some of the things that I was struggling with, namely my self-doubt and self-sabotage. I mentioned how I consistently talked down to myself, especially in uncomfortable social situations. She framed what I was experienced through a metaphor, which has stuck with me to this day, perhaps because it is just so damn easy to remember.
"We all have an itty-bitty-shitty committee that lives within us," she said. "The committee is always looking for ways to reaffirm its authority, and is especially empowered by our so-called 'failures'. The committee isn't you!"
This simple conversation has stuck with me some ten years after the fact. The simple, yet catchy way in which she framed our subconscious and shadow self has helped me recognize my negative thought patterns as my itty-bitty-shitty committee.
Admittedly, despite this awareness of the thoughts being mental programs implanted into my subconscious by others throughout my life, I have still struggled with a self-deprecating mindset. Recently, I began looking for answers and discovered a concept that, while also incredibly simple in nature, has been a revelation to my mindset.
Autosuggestion as a way to replace the committee
It was the suggestion of fellow steemer @crypt0 that inspired me to read the book "Think and Grow Rich" by Napolean Hill. If you haven't read this all-time classic in self-help literature, I highly recommend you check it out. One of the most useful concepts from the book has been the idea of Autosuggestion.
Autosuggestion is the hypnotic or subconscious adoption of an idea that one has originated oneself, e.g. through repetition of verbal statements to oneself in order to change behavior. This is done by repeating affirmations over and over until your subconscious mind accepts it as truth. It is essentially self-hypnosis.
In Hill's book, he recommends the phrase "Every day, in every way, I am getting better and better". The more genuine emotion you put into the phrase, the more powerful the effect will be. I tend to state this phrase aloud while driving or while exercising, as a way to retrain my mind.
The effects are subtle at first, but over time you begin to notice that the itty-bitty-shitty committee has started to fade away. The power of its message begins to reduce and is instead replaced by a message of encouragement and belief in one's self.
We all have a plethora of messages running in our minds that serve to take us off course and prevent us from running at our most optimal states. By retraining and replacing these messages with ones that serve us, we can utilize one of the greatest sources of power we have in our lives: our subconscious. Autosuggestion done correctly will allow you to fire your itty-bitty-shitty commitee once at for all.
All uncredited pictures from the pixabay.com
I also believe in autosuggestion, and there are many things to try and destroy this shitty committee. I've tried super positive self affirmation to nihilism and each concept has its place. When it comes to this specifically, as you say it'd probably be best to drown everything out in your head with a catchy positive phrase. I also replace my desktop and phone wallpapers with different pictures or phrases that pump me up now, and that seems to help too. The realization that this voice in your head isn't you but just projections of others, and thus a committee you can fire is really important, and probably step one.
That's awesome that you've also had positive results with autosuggestion. The idea of putting up reminders any place possible is a terrific idea.
It's incredible the space that we have in our mind when it's not filled with distorted and negative ideas!
Really nice article thank you ,auto suggestion is a good way to keep your focus on what important but it won't work if you don't mean the words when you say it .It is not what you say important, important is what you mean.
Definitely. You need to put real emotion behind your words if they are to be accepted by the subconscious.