Issue #99

Rewiring the Voice in Your Head: A Seller’s Guide

Your brain has a built-in storyteller. Scientists call it the Default Mode Network (DMN).

When you’re not glued to a spreadsheet or delivering a pitch, this network takes over.

It lights up when you’re daydreaming, recalling memories, imagining the future, or wondering if that prospect thinks you’re an idiot because you misspelled their company name on every slide (true story).

The DMN is a circuit connecting parts of your brain responsible for memory, self-reflection, and simulating possible futures.

It’s the reason you can rehearse tomorrow’s meeting in your head or suddenly remember a cringe moment from three years ago while brushing your teeth.

Just before we get into some detail on the DMN, here are some other beliefs that could be limiting your sales success, click the image to get a list of the ten to watch out for.

What The Damn DMN Does

• Memory Retrieval: It digs up past experiences and stitches them into your personal narrative.
• Future Simulation: It runs mental previews of what might happen next, both good and bad.
• Self-Appraisal: It evaluates who you are, what others think of you (as far as you know), and how you fit into the social world.
• Social Thinking: It helps you imagine others’ intentions, feelings, and reactions - vital for sales conversations.

Why We Ruminate

The DMN evolved to keep humans alive. It scans your past for mistakes to avoid repeating them. It simulates threats so you’re ready to act.

That’s helpful if you’re dodging tigers. Less helpful when you’re trying to sleep and your brain insists on replaying the time you messed up that price slide.

The problem is the DMN can’t tell the difference between a real threat and a social embarrassment. So it loops endlessly, turning minor worries into epic mental dramas.

How to Train It to Work for You

Want your DMN to serve you rather than sabotage you? Here’s how to shape it into a powerful sales ally.

Script Your Success Reels

Once a day, close your eyes for 2 minutes and replay a specific moment you succeeded; a deal won, a compliment received, a negotiation turned in your favour.

Picture the details. Feel the emotions. Your DMN treats mental rehearsal like reality and updates your self-story.

Interrupt Doom Loops

When you catch your brain spiralling (‘They’ll hate my proposal’), label it as Thinking, not fact.

Then shift gears: stand up, take 10 slow breaths.

Say out loud, “Not helpful, move on.”

You can’t always stop thoughts, but you can stop following them down the rabbit hole.

Run Future Scenarios on Purpose

Before a big call, direct your DMN to preview positive outcomes instead of train wrecks.

Walk through the conversation in your head, from greeting to handshake, imagining the client nodding along.

Practise this like a mental dry-run.

Here’s a story and short framework to help with this, click the pic to read.

Feed It Better Input

Your DMN learns from what you expose it to. Limit negative chatter like news, social media rants, the colleague who forecasts doom.

Surround yourself with ideas, people, and content focused on possibility and progress.

Use Written Reflection

At the end of each day, write a short paragraph: “What did I do well today?” It forces your DMN to catalogue positives instead of only errors.

Writing seems to make you take it more seriously than just going through it mentally.

The DMN isn’t your enemy. It’s just your brain’s internal narrator.

The same network that creates self-doubt can also build unstoppable self-belief.

In sales, that’s not a nice-to-have. It’s the difference between showing up as a hesitant rep or a trusted advisor who owns the room.

It also helps to know what triggers you into having a great day…or not, it's all related to your values, watch this to find out (5 minutes that could change your life):

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Don't forget to tell your friends about this newsletter, they will buy you drinks all night if you do.
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If this sounds fascinating then drop me an email about coaching or just for a chat, I'm remarkably friendly (most of the time).

Have I mentioned I created a course to give you all the basic skills and knowledge you need to be an enterprise seller?

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