It’s been a while since I last posted some original content hasn’t it dear reader? So today I place this sequence here, hoping that it will help me achieve my resolutions for this year.

Tell me reader, do you have inner voices? What do they sound like? Are they encouraging? Perhaps sympathetic? Or could it be that they are not very nice at all?

All inner voices were at some point in our history outer voices that due to the circumstances of the moment we heard them, or by sheer repetition, were lodged in our minds so that we ended up repeating them on our own.

For some people, like me, the inner voices can be rather pessimistic and punitive, quick to panic and in general an amalgamation of our worst sides. However, there is hope even for people like me; for inner voices can be altered by the same powers that created them, by convincing arguments in the right moments, or by simple repetition.

We might find the voices we need in a friend, in a therapist, o in the author of our favorites books, and that is in a way what I hope to become in the future. A sympathetic outer voice that with enough repetition can become an inner voice.

So what does this have to do with plushies?

Well, if you had the chance to own a plushy yourself at a young age you might be able to remember the voice you gave it. Many people at a young age own some sort of soft toy, to which they give a calming, soothing and understanding voice; one that assures the child that everything will be ok. Psychologists think this is a way children practice the art of being nice to themselves, something that will be very useful in the grown up world.

Eventually the child has talked to himself for so long through the plushy that he no longer needs it, the voice of the toy is now the voice of the child, and the toy returns to its original form.

I want to be like those toys; a caring voice for others, a reminder that we are all worthy of affection, one that can be found reliably and regularly, always present at the beginning but progressively losing my “toyhood” as they gain the skill of being nice to themselves.