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How many times have you refused to pick up the phone because the number was not familiar to you and you thought it was a telemarketer? Have you ever deleted a message before listening to all it because you just didn't want to hear it? And have you ever saved a message from a new romantic interest or a message from someone you love, just to play it over and over again to hear the sound of his or her voice?

We get to pick and choose which external messages we receive. We can delete a message we don't want to receive and save a message we want for future reference. With caller ID, we don't even have to answer the phone to see who's calling us. If we don't want to talk to someone, we just don't answer. With spam guard and email block lists, we don't even have to receive any notification of messages we don't want to receive.

What about those internal messages?

You know those messages that say, "I'm not good enough. There's no use in trying. This always happens to me. That was so stupid, why did I do that? No one loves me. I'm worthless. I'm bad . . . . " Why would we save and listen to those internal messages that make us feel so bad?

Why doesn't even matter. Spending time on analyzing why we listen to those internal messageS and where they come from can use up a lot of time. The question is WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT THEM?

First we can identify those internal messages with our internal caller ID. Recognize the nagging number? Do you want to listen to that negative message? If the answer is NO, then don't answer the phone! If a message is there that you answer and decide you don't want to receive it, you can (in your nicest "no thank you, bug off" voice) say, "Sorry, I'm not interested." How about, "Stop calling me and please take me off this call list!". Or just slam down the phone! Put on the spam guard and put those negative internal messages on your block-list.

If they're recurring internal messages that we've saved for a long time, we can go through and delete them. Delete them before listening to the whole message! Beep, delete. Beep, delete.

Better yet, start filling your internal mailbox and message center with the kind of messages you want to hear. Louise Hay, author and lecturer, has a whole book, "You Can Heal Your Life", dedicated to replacing old messages with new messages. Emmett Fox says that we cannot not think about something. That when we decide not to think about the Statue of Liberty, we're thinking about the Statue of Liberty. We must have something to replace

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