Talk Nice to You and Others Will Too

Never be a verbal abuser to the person you need to care for the most—YOU! When you say negative things to yourself, you are unconsciously chipping away at your self-worth, which obviously diminishes your selfesteem. You might think that you are being humble by cutting yourself down or being self-deprecating, but you are not.
Instead you are exhibiting a weakness—a “one-downsmanship” that your verbally hostile opponent can latch onto. In essence, you are giving your opponent more verbal ammunition to use against you. It may feel okay or painless when you make a cutting remark about yourself. When that cutting remark comes out of the mouths of other people, however, suddenly there is a painful sting to their zing! They might even add more verbal poison to the cutting remarks you already made about yourself. They may embellish what you said, thereby making their cut even deeper and more excruciating by hitting one of your most vulnerable emotional spots. Imagine.
The moral of this lesson is this: Don't add to the arsenal of your verbal enemy—don't say bad things to yourself.