Inner Dialogue
“A person’s fate is determined by what takes place in their mind when they come into conflict with the outer world.”…
(Eric Berne)
I came to realize that a child perceives our familiar world differently. That is, a newborn’s perception of the environment differs from that of an adult. I’m not referring to physiological development. A child truly sees, because for them, the things familiar to us do not yet exist. A newborn perceives energy in its immediate, natural form—the energetic essence of the surrounding world. As the child grows, they begin to be taught, and through this process, societal stereotypes are imposed. Adults are more focused on teaching the child specific material objects—how this or that item looks—overlooking the perception of the energetic world that an infant inherently possesses. As a result, the child adopts the adult position, accepted by society, and loses the ability to “see.” Therefore, we can say that our perception of the world is illusory. This is how our inner dialogue is activated.
Inner dialogue occurs through silently verbalizing words and thoughts to oneself—it is the process of information processing. This process cannot fundamentally be switched off, since the brain functions even during sleep, except during deep dreamless sleep. And since there is indeed this exception, one can enter this state, of course, not immediately. Practices aimed at stopping the inner dialogue are based on freeing one’s attention from habitual perception in order to see the world differently, without templates.
This information first became relevant to me not because I wanted to control my thoughts, but because I wished to feel silence in my consciousness. Later, during work with Tarot cards, I again turned to this practice. It is difficult to access the unconscious while the mind is filled with thoughts. Even when analyzing an astrological chart, this topic remains relevant for me—to see the essence, not my own unprocessed history. It is an interesting and new skill: observing the world from a certain detachment, learning to look with “empty” attention, free from labels.
“We are constantly talking to ourselves about our world. In fact, we create our world through our inner dialogue. When we stop talking to ourselves, the world becomes as it truly is. We renew it, we give it life—we sustain it through our inner dialogue. And not only that: we also choose our paths according to what we tell ourselves. Thus, we keep repeating the same choice over and over until we die, because we continue the same inner dialogue. A warrior becomes aware of this and strives to stop his inner dialogue.”
Carlos Castaneda
Blog author – Anna Vejan