Just talking.

Sometimes a few words can make all the difference.

A few years ago, when I start getting into the blogging/personal writing space and taking time for self-reflection, I realized that I often struggled with understanding my own thoughts.

Our thoughts really can race, and when it feels like we only have a few moments to truly grasp them, we can become overwhelmed and confused by our emotions.

The writing I began to do helped a lot, but sometimes even seeing the words written down from my thoughts still seemed misunderstood.

One night, right before winter break, I sat down during a moment where I felt overwhelmed emotionally.

I was just at my desk and I started talking out loud.

I basically was talking to myself, but instead of just saying things out loud, I was listening.

I was listening to my own thoughts truly out loud.

And I began to feel what it was like to hear and understand what they mean.

Sometimes our thoughts can’t really be put into words.

We just are feeling something.

However, when we start to just open our mouth, our mind, our ears… we really do start to understand and hear what’s going on.

I was shocked at the learning this brought me.

I was so relieved to be able to understand thoughts in that moment.

I soon realized that not only talking to myself out loud helped, but what if I talked about those things to more sets of ears?

More people who I knew would listen and help?

So, that’s what I did.

And that was some of the best learning I have truly ever discovered.

It is often hard for us to just openly talk about things. I totally understand not being ready to talk about what may be on your mind.

However, if you get to the point where you feel comfortable talking about it, start with just talking through things with yourself first.

Once you can truly open up and listen to how you feel to yourself, it becomes much easier to open up to others, too.

There are many people in each of our lives that understand us, but none better than ourselves.

By starting with opening up to ourselves, we get the self-understanding we need. Once that occurs, it makes the advice of others that much more of a bonus.

I encourage you just to speak your thoughts out loud today when you feel overwhelmed.

Listening is a powerful thing, but even more powerful when truly listening to yourself.

NS

(1,2,3,4,5,6 – COWAS // ta)