Our Rotten Gut Voices Need One Badass Fairy Godmother
Or one giant colonic — the constipation of negative self-talk
Once upon a time, I was ruled by the false beliefs of my gut voice.
I still am but I used to be too.
It was April 2021 and I’d been living in my pokey studio for 8 months and I’d caught my upstairs neighbour in our shared hallway. It was only the second time I’d ever seen him.
With my hands clutching full bin bags for the outside, we did the British thing and engaged in stair-walking small talk.
He asked:
“How’ve you been?”
I answered:
“I’m good. Taking out the rubbish and being clean for once…”
We parted ways at the big green bin container and I returned inside shortly after. It only hit me after ascending the stairs and hearing my heavy studio door slam behind me. My eye skin widened to meet two severe eyebrows now framing my penetrating stare ahead.
Why the hell did I say that to him!?
I’d put myself down to this relatively new person as an automated response. As if my gut spoke directly for me and I was just its passenger.
My gut learned to talk sh*t to me
In May 2020, I was in lockdown, bubbling with my family in their cottage. I was also working with a high-paying freelance client who also happened to be an old coworking buddy.
The job enabled me to get into healthy habits. I woke up at 6 am, did an Emi Wong workout in the garden, and worked from a cosy room in a quiet, COVID-free household.
Sounds like an ideal time for everything to go wrong, doesn’t it?
Well, it did.
The client was demanding far too much of me — and paid me unfairly for it. I was so stressed out by the evolving demands that were swelling like an angry puberty zit on the face of my life. I needed out.
That June, the big contract ended abruptly — as did our friendship.
Why? They got legal on me. They thought from my ‘I’m quitting’ email that I was threatening to leave them high and dry without handovers — which was a huge misconception on their part. So the next email I received was from his lawyer.
She even tried quoting me on terms from an outdated contract, which I’d written…
Girl, bye.
The pandemic saw a 300% rise in the number of self-employed people saying they have “poor” or “very poor” mental health — and I’d become one of them, thanks to my negative self-talk.
It’s a villain without a redeeming backstory.
At times like this, you want your bed to finally swallow the teaspoon of willpower you put aside to get out of it each morning.
I punished myself for quitting yet another job due to not being able to hack it. It was the evidence I needed to believe I was incapable of sticking things out, so that’s what I started telling myself.
“You’re so fragile. You can’t even hack a full-time job.”
“Maybe you can’t stick working for other people because you’re selfish.”
“You’re CV is a f*cking joke.”
“Don’t bother trying that again — history will just repeat itself.”
“There’s something wrong with you.”
I wished I could just go somewhere and get a mental colonic to sh*t all of it out already. I still do.
If there was a modern-day fairy godmother, it would be Marisa Peer. She’s made a 30-year living out of hypnotizing Hollywood celebrities, CEOs, royalty, and sports stars into believing they can do anything they put their minds to.
It’s her “bibbity bobbity boo” to the world.
Back then, just opening myself up to these YouTube videos was enough. My subtle form of therapy when other help was scarce.
Despite their best efforts at empowering me, they didn’t stick — and I’m still where I was over 18 months ago.
We just need our own best colonic
To this day, the idea of positive self-talk practice still makes me cringe. Looking at my bathroom mirror reflection dead in the eyes and repeating “you are a talented writer. You deserve happiness and success. You are worthy,” is just too far out of my comfort zone.
Without constantly having those positive influences, these new beliefs can slip back into the old.
Even if Marisa Peer herself was my fairy godmother, I’m not sure she’d be ready to talk down my gut voice.
If we’re not ready, then hearing self-hypnosis techniques is as effective as trying to treat a clinically depressed person by saying “cheer up”.
Get real.
It’s true we need other people in our lives so as not to alienate us from the support we might need. But even with the world’s best mentors leading us to water, only we can drink in new ways of speaking to ourselves.
We each need to figure out what works for us. Our own way to flush out the deep-rooted build-up of rotten gut bacteria to make way for fresh water.
So instead of wishing for self-improvement miracles, let’s try and focus on finding our own best colonic.
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