So what’s Monster Whispering?

Monster whispering is an approach to dealing with your fear, resistance and negative self talk that’s a little different to more popular methods taught by therapists, TV show hosts or drill sergeants.

In monster whispering, you let a monster, either as a cartoon or simply in your head, provide the voice of your fear or resistance, and then you engage it in conversation. A productive conversation, not one that goes like this:

Monster: But what about this? What about that?
You: That doesn’t matter! Shut up shut up!
Monster: Aaaaaah!
You: Aaaaaaah!

Because who needs that, right?

You mean I talk to myself? Isn’t that what crazy people do?

Well, maybe. I get that it might sound a bit crazy, and I certainly make no claims of exceptional sanity. It’s useful to keep in mind that the whole monster thing is a metaphor, it’s a game we play to find out interesting things about how we think.

Engaging with the darker, more primitive, unwilling parts of your mind in this way can have real and useful results. Better results than the usual tactics of telling yourself to stop wasting time being afraid (Seth Godin) or feeling the fear and doing it anyway, which isn’t helpful if the fear has you so paralysed you can’t even think of what it was you wanted to do in the first place.

The secret to Monster Whispering

The number one principle. The reason you can stop running away.

Your monsters are on your side.

That doesn’t mean they’re right about everything they say. It doesn’t mean you should do what they tell you. But it does mean you can stop fighting them, because they are not your enemies.

Your monsters are a part of your mind. They are a part of you. They really aren’t out to sabotage you, make you pull out your hair in frustration or cry into a tub of ice-cream every evening. That may be all they actually accomplish, but it isn’t what they set out to do. They set out to help. To keep you safe. To keep you from pain.

These are good intentions. Often it is hard to imagine our monsters are trying to help, because they are so loud and rude and obnoxious. So how do you get to what they’re really trying to tell you?

The secret tool: questions.

Questions. Specifically, the right questions. This is an example of a not-right question:

Why won’t you let me raise this issue with my boss, do you want me to ignore it until it blows up in my face and I get fired? Well?!

There’s really no good answer to that and your monster is likely to just clam up and tell you to stuff it, you’re not going. This is a more useful question:

OK, I see you’re not happy about this talk with the boss. Tell me about that. How do you think it will go?

Or:

Can you think of any circumstances where it would be OK for me to go have this talk?

Asking good questions gets you information. Information is the key to figuring out a way forward.

Your monster will answer your questions as best it can. That might mean it offers an indirect answer, or it may start yelling, or it may change the subject or bite your head off.

That’s OK. It’s a monster, this is what monsters do. Don’t lose your nerve and keep your eye on the prize.

The goal in monster-whispering

The goal in monster-whispering is not to get your monster to shut up. The goal is to understand it, make peace with it, and get the two of you to work together. This is the hardest thing about monster whispering. It is so easy to get drawn into arguments and trying to prove your monster wrong.

Don’t do it.

Even if you win the argument and manage to make your monster look stupid, the situation will be as it was before. Even if you lay the smack down on that monster, you will not win. It’s useful to remember what your monster actually is.

Part of you.

Kicking yourself isn’t fun, profitable or in any way helpful. Your monster will be hurt, and possibly shut up and find an underground, less obvious way to sabotage you and keep you safe from yourself. If you play to win, you’ll only drive your monster underground, or you might even lose the argument, and you’re not likely to feel much better then.

So don’t play to win. Play to make peace.

The best way to do this is to learn about your monsters, what they want and need, see things from their perspective, and also clearly tell them about the effect they have on you and what you might need from them.

This isn’t easy, but you will get better with practice and if you can do it, your monsters might end up actually helping you.

Tagged as: monster whispering, non-violence