Up to now I’ve never shared my personal feelings on my blog. That may be partly because I’m in touch with who I really am, and what I’m really like, and how un-like the majority of people I am, and so how few people can tolerate me! As my brother once said to me so succinctly, “You’re weird!”.
He didn’t realize it, but that was one of the nicest things anyone’s ever said to me. Weirdness has its benefits. Give me “weird” any time…
I remarked to someone the other day on the importance of talking to yourself. In open conversation we all make fun of the practice, but I suspect the reality is that a good many or most of us do it. After all, sometimes it’s the only way to have an intelligent conversation, right? So I said to this person, who I won’t name, that by talking to ourselves we stay in contact with who we really are. We reconcile ourselves to an otherwise hostile world. We organize our thoughts and make them more solid in our consciousness. We pragmatically consider both or all sides of the issues at hand (if we have any sense), and we provide friendship for ourselves which may not otherwise be available. Who can we trust if we can’t trust ourselves?
We may be afraid of being considered to be slightly insane if others see us talking to ourselves, and that’s understandable, because we all feel that those who do so with no self-consciousness at all may well be unhinged in some way. But surely we all have thought-conversations with ourselves, inside our minds, don’t we? It’s impossible not to (I think). And we don’t consider ourselves to be mad for that. So what’s the harm, now and then, with a little one-on-one conversation, when nobody else is around? We talk to our pets, we talk to the television, we talk to the driver in front of us: why not talk to our best friends-ourselves?
Looking at my view count lately, I may well be talking to myself now…
Ah, but someone else is always around-God. Statements like that one make the atheist and the unbeliever become certain that I and others like me are not playing with a full deck. They forget all the many benefits believers with great minds have given the world-men like Pascal, Francis Bacon, Kepler, Newton, Boyle, Tolkein, C.S Lewis and countless others.
God hears us. In fact, he knows our thoughts, and hears all our words. Herein is one of the potentially huge benefits of talking to ourselves, whether in our minds or out loud. When we do it within the knowledge and control of God’s spirit, and while also talking to our God, we can talk ourselves into a right way of thinking:
…be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is–his good, pleasing and perfect will (Romans 12:2).
Bless the Lord, O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits (Psalm 103:1-2).
