I just finished listening to a really powerful podcast. It's long, but for me it was impressive enough that it kept me from doing much else while I listened, so maybe not a good idea unless you have the full 53 minutes to devote. A great car trip piece more so than something while cleaning the house.
Our world is full of words but some people have their internal dialog externalized.
One thing we know now more than ever is that people hear voices at a much higher rate than we have thought previously existed. One reason for this, probably THE reason for this is that until recently we believed that hearing voices was one of the primary "symptoms" (I'll mention why this is in quotes later on) of being "crazy." In fact it is one of the primary positive symptoms of schizophrenia still. What was once thought of as extra-normal is now seen as sub-normal. It was once seen as indicative of extreme emotional and psychological awareness and is now seen as paranormal or unexplainable and unnatural.
So our culture put up a great big billboard reminding everyone who hears voices or knows someone that hears voices to never mention this unless they are absolutely forced to. That admitting you hear voices is the same as admitting you are Crazy with the big C; that you are schizophrenic.
So when, on a UK radio program, a woman mentioned she heard voices but did not show other signs of being classically mentally ill, it challenged a lot of people's thinking. The radio program received over 45 phone calls during and after the program from people who reported also hearing voices. These were not 45 people with schizophrenia. What came of this was a new way of looking at these voices and a new way of relating to them.
We first develop our own inner dialog by being talked to by an external voice, that of our parents or caregivers. Eventually we develop a dialog with those voices and then somewhere around this time we start thinking in words. We start Hearing Voices internally. Think about it right now. What is it that is a mixture of the colors red and blue? Do you visualize this color only or do you also say the word for it? It gets even more problematic as we get older. Here's another question: How do you feel when a close friend forgets to invite you someplace special? . . . Give yourself time to feel about this. No. Give yourself more time. Has it been even 10 seconds? Fine. Good enough. Did you feel the answers or did you think about the words for the answers? Maybe Hurt, Angry, Lonely, Upset, Disappointed. Words have supplanted the actual emotion for most of us.
This inner monolog may then have originated from our principle dialog (which itself was one-sided until we could talk). It doesn't take much of a jump to deduce how a person's external dialog would soon become our inner monolog.