Relying on a host of laboratory studies and compelling anecdotal evidence-like the story of major league pitcher Rick Ankiel, who suddenly lost the ability to control a baseball but reinvented himself as an outfielder-Kross is an amiable guide through this fascinating and complex territory. When he received an anonymous threatening letter several years ago, Kross, who directs the Emotion and Self-Control Laboratory at the University of Michigan, first turned inward to investigate how our default biological state creates an “inescapable tension of the inner voice as both helpful superpower and destructive kryptonite.” Any attempt to silence that voice, he explains, is doomed, but through a process of trial and error, most people can find some method of transforming it from foe to friend. In Chatter: The Voice in Our Head, Why It Matters, and How to Harness It, experimental psychologist and neuroscientist Ethan Kross provides a useful introduction to some of the intriguing research on this phenomenon and offers a toolbox full of constructive techniques for quieting our persistent inner voice or, better yet, turning it in a positive direction.

But when they are born, we can baptize them or perform any other of a variety of birth rituals that provide us with an illusion of control.In Buddhism it’s referred to as “monkey mind”-that cascade of often critical and judgmental self-talk that runs in a ceaseless loop in our heads. For example, we can’t control what will happen to our children throughout their lives, and we can protect them only to a limited degree, which is a source of chatter for many parents. Many rituals also provide us with a sense of order, because we perform behaviors we can control. This might explain why pregame rituals abound in sports, providing a distraction at the most anxiety-filled moment. For one, they direct our attention away from what’s bothering us the demands they place on working memory to carry out the tasks of the ritual leave little room for anxiety and negative manifestations of the inner voice. “The reason rituals are so effective at helping us manage our inner voices is that they’re a chatter-reducing cocktail that influences us through several avenues.

Chatter book ethan