Fearne Cotton - Quiet : silencing the brain chatter and believing that youre good enough

FEARNE COTTON

Silencing the brain chatter and believing that
youre good enough

For Rex and Honey and all their noise

Contents

Whenever you see this symbol in the book: come back to this page and write within the spaces of the rainbow brain any thoughts or concerns youre experiencing, or any of your own negative voices that are putting you down. Come back to this page at the end of the book to see how many of those thoughts, concerns and worries are still there hopefully they will be a little quieter or have disappeared into the background.

I know, I know the irony. A book called Quiet written by someone who talks for a living. Well, this is not a book about enforced silence or muting oneself, as of course I do love a bit of noise, whether its the husk of Dave Grohls voice blaring out of a speaker, my kids cracking up with laughter at each other or a crowd roaring with cheer and jubilation when someone incredible walks on to a stage. Noise can swell our emotions and inspire us to move, but I have also reached a point in my life where I really appreciate some quiet, too. Not just literal silence but also a mind free from negative Chatter and self-analysis. A quiet that comes from reducing that Chatter in our heads and having the confidence to ignore it. As you may know, I love a good chat, so try and imagine what is going on upstairs in my brain! At times its like a UN peace negotiation up there. Toing and froing, bartering and convincing, constant ideas and worries. Its non-stop! Thats why, over the last few years especially, finding the tools to switch off the noise and find the quiet has been so important to me, and I hope that can be important to you, too.

Quiet: A State of Mind

This book is certainly not about committing to a decade of silence while seeking out a woodland dwelling to retreat to in order to block out the modern world. Its about taming the much louder and cerebral beast that lives within the confines of our own skulls: this bad inner Chatter. We all know it has the power to overthrow gut instinct, shout us down when we are faced with fear and talk us out of new adventures yet few of us have a grip on it. We will all suffer from a chattery brain to varying degrees and Im sure most of us would love to know how to turn down the volume on it all so we can focus better, feel less anxious and try new things in life I know I would! This is where the quiet comes in. That space and clarity that allows us to acknowledge those thoughts and that inner dialogue yet not take every word seriously.

The quiet is a slice of time in between thought and action where we can make a decision that isnt based purely on what the negative Chatter is telling us. It is an inner knowledge that we understand our own thought patterns but know we dont have to be ruled by them. Within the quiet we can act more intuitively and go with our guts and hearts to make decisionsthat feel authentic and positive. If we learn to find this quiet, we can hone in on how we really feel, as we arent muddled by the negative thoughts and patterns we are so used to slipping into.

Quiet is a state of mind and one that requires a little discipline and effort. Its of course much easier to stay in habitual patterns, even if they are negative, as we are used to them. So to tune in to the much-needed quiet we need to put a little work in. Im giving it a jolly good go alongside you, so will be cheerleading you along the way, as well as offering up some methods and theories Ive learned so far.

The Chatter

So what exactly do I mean by the Chatter? Its the negative stuff: what can sometimes feel like a constant barrage of head noise that often tries to take us down. Its the shitty names we call ourselves, the stories we play over again and again in our heads which we believe define who we are, the labels we assume others have given us that leave us feeling alienated, phrases that play on a loop when were scared that have the ability to aggravate and coax out every tricky emotion. Little of this Chatter is true but that doesnt stopus from noticing it and acting accordingly. Our brains are of course capable of so much brilliance: thoughts and ideas bubbling up like a shaken bottle of pop; mental exploration and expansion that can lead to great change and kindness and empathy towards others. Yet we also allow thoughts to hold us back and keep us spinning in cycles of mental pain.

Of course, this Chatter isnt heard with our ears but is clear as day in our minds. You may hear your own voice as the inner dialogue rambles on; a cinematic version of it, narrating your life as it plays out. Perhaps it is just thoughts and images that you scroll through mentally, bringing up the negative or feared like an Instagram feed of your life. We might not be able to drown out the Chatter, or lose it for good, but I do believe if we take it much less seriously and remind ourselves that these thoughts are just one version of a story rather than hard facts, we can start to live alongside it with much more ease.

Ill give you an example. Whenever I walk into a room at a party, full of people I know, sort of know and dont know at all, I instantly assume, due to the negative dialogue rabbiting away upstairs in my head, that everyone in that room thinks Im a twat. I can hear the mental Chatter starting up immediately, telling me that everyone is smarter, cooler and definitely doesnt have a Tupperware of crackers in their bag in case theyget hungry later. BUT wait if I can find my way into the quiet, then I can remember this narrative is just ONE version of events. Maybe SOME people dont like me, but that doesnt mean that everyone doesnt. Maybe I will make a new friend or help out a hungry pre-existing friend with the aforementioned snacks. The negative Chatter isnt based on fact. Its assumption, fantasy and, for me, usually a little self-torture, too.

We Are All Experts

Much like with my other books, Happy and Calm, I do not profess to have this one down pat (clearly, from that last anecdote). I do not exclusively work from positivity or the gut and have yet to master how to rid myself of that negative dialogue we all seem to weirdly cling to. Im very much at the bottom of the ladder with this one, but in the last couple of years I have climbed up a rung or two due to the fact that I can now easily notice when these aggravating voices spark up. I can weed out the crap-talking, confidence-thwarting Chatter from the authentic wisdom that is in there somewhere. We are all brimming with inner wisdom and are naturally experts in our specialist subject: ourselves. Yet we allow the negativethoughts and dialogue to confuse us. We forget how capable we are, how strong we can be and how deep we have dug before. There is confidence there even if its hidden; there is courage, beauty, wisdom and belief we just need some quiet to notice it.