Talking to Yourself

The other night, at around 11.30pm, when all were asleep, I sat at my dining room table. The lights were off and the dim street lamps from the apparent calm outside was my only source of illumination - that and the blue fluro from our electric bug zapper. I had just consumed a particularly welcome glass of RC Cola, laced with a drop of Montpelier (I don't know what it is, but it's a poor substitute for scotch). The alcohol went straight to my head.

I leaned against the back of my chair, my head resting against the cold wall behind me. I closed my eyes. Breathing deeply, I was certain to fall asleep right then and there, in the bliss of my tipsiness.

And then a voice spoke.

It was me.

For some inexplicable reason I began a conversation with myself. I spoke about what was on my mind. Things that I have been thinking but never voiced. It was a strange experience. I opened one eye and glanced around the room, sort of expecting to see another version of me sitting there speaking with me. All I saw was a moth flying at full velocity towards the bug zapper, inexorably to its death. Zap.

I admit, it was weird. It was strange. It was, well, both a dialogue and a monologue rolled into one. But it was also therapeutic. And the experience prompted me to do a bit of research. A quick Google search brought me to a self-therapy website, which has a section about speaking to yourself. If you take a look, you will see that they justify talking to yourself as "a hallmark of being human and proof that we are a higher species". I think it's a sign that we can't afford real therapy.

But sometimes, during the normal course of the day, I find that speaking out loud can help. It sort of gets things in order, "Right, first I'll do this, then I'll do that - no wait, I'd better do the other first and then do that. Right".

But what bugs me is that when I am holding a mental conversation with myself (ie: inside my head), then I think of things before I think of them. For instance, I'm debating an issue - should I do something or not. And when I present an argument for one side, I already know what the counter argument is going to be - and then I am compelled to use that argument as the counter argument, knowing that the first side already has a counter-counter argument because, after all, it's the one brain arguing against itself. So I'm thinking things before I think them. Follow? Put simply, it's almost like being self-psychic, "I knew I was going to say that!"

What particularly cracks me up is when I make jokes to myself. Sometimes when I'm alone, I'm rather funny - but then there's that pre-thinking thing that ruins the punchline. I think of the joke or the witticism and then I voice it. But I already know the punchline because I just thought it through in my head. It sort of kills the whole point of the joke. But I laugh anyway.

I think it's good to talk to yourself. I wouldn't go so far as to call myself on the phone, "Hello? Oh, it's you! So tell me, what's news?". What I mean is, you have to live your whole life with yourself so you may as well learn to carry on a decent conversation with yourself. At least I know that when I talk with myself, I'm assured of holding a conversation with someone at least as intelligent as me.