Can You Hear Yourself Think?

[Lab 5- April 19: Enabling occupation through coping – Lived experience exercise]

I often have my earbuds in whenever I'm walking, waiting for the bus or commuting.  Even when I'm not out and about, my room is rarely a complete silence because I enjoy working with a bit of background music. But hearing music is different from hearing voices. I'm sure that we all have a voice or two inside our heads. That inner self-talk that guides us through everything from high-stress situations to making mental lists of what to do throughout the day. Without hearing myself think, I'm sure I'd feel a bit lonely when I'm without my music on my long walks home. But I would never describe my self dialogue as disturbing or interfering with my everyday activities. My experience in this Lived Experience of Psychosis lab, showed me how difficult it really is to live with hearing a constant cacophony of voices and odd noises.

I definitely felt very distracted listening to those audio tracks while walking around, and I found that I talked much less to my peers because I was trying to figure out what was going on for that track. Tracks that resembled music were much easier to ignore, but when it came to the voices, I was inclined to try and figure out what they were trying to say to me.

Through our class discussion, some strategies were discussed about how we coped with walking around the community with these voices or strange noises:

• lowering the volume
• switching tracks
• talking more with our peers to remove the focus from the experience of 'psychosis'
• having only one earbud in when talking to those in the community

The idea that all our coping strategies dealt with having Control over the voices really stood out to me. Those who experience psychosis do not have the luxury of choosing to lower the volume or switch tracks on their auditory hallucinations. It makes me appreciate the positive voices that I have in my life even more: the supportive voices of family and friends, advice and words of wisdom from mentors and professors, and the loving words from those who especially touch my heart.

RESOURCES to listen to and think about:
All kinds of minds (8 TED Talks)

Of these 8 TED Talks, I especially enjoyed Ruby Wax's comedic presentation of her experience with mental illness. She has a way of getting people's attention and driving home her ideas about mental illness and stigma.


A movement that was discussed only briefly at the end of this lab was called the Hearing Voices Movement. I think raising awareness of voice hearing groups will help reduce self-stigma for those who have auditory hallucinations. Those who support this movement work to enable and support voice hearers and their experiences with voices.

Intervoice: The International Network for Training, Education and Research into Hearing Voices.