What did you say?

If I work hard enough I can control any situation.

I am worthy as long as I am successful

When is the other shoe gonna drop?

No one understands me.

Ah yes, those voices inside our heads. Okay, my head. You too? Maybe not these voices but others? That voice that tells you have to be perfect. That voice that tells you to avoid conflict and therefore mask your feelings. That voice that tells you receiving help means being helpless.

Do not worry, my friends., I have not morphed into a spouter of self-help gobbledegook. I am not about to (gasp) write a book about any of this. The shelves are groaning with books like this.

But I am interested in this take on those sabotaging voices inside our heads by the “positive intelligence” training guru and, yes, best-selling author, Shirzad Chamine, a Stanford lecturer and Fortune 500 corporate coach. By the way, you might consider not buying his book. He does not need your money.

Speaking Fee:
Live Event Fee: $30,000 – $50,000
Virtual Event Fee: $10,000 – $20,000

But you can take his “Saboteur Assessment” test  for free—and you might learn something about yourself. Or, like me, nod your head in agreement about what you already know about yourself. Because those (potentially) sabotaging voices are so very familiar.

Can I (we) just stop listening? I doubt it. (Oh no, is that one of my saboteurs talking to me?) I do think that by naming these voices—Charmine identifies 10—we can at least recognize what they are doing, or the dark and unproductive places they “illuminate” for us. And then…Reason with them? Shout them down? Stuff a sock in their mouth?

Here are the nasty little beings making noise inside your (my) head. Tell them to shut the fuck up. (That’s probably not the advice what Shirzad Charmine charges $50,000 for.) Mine is free!

1. Judge
2. Controller
3. Hyper-achiever
4. Restless
5. Stickler
6. Pleaser
7. Hyper-vigilant
8. Avoider
9. Victim
10. Hyper-rational