[Nick]

"The one from Castaneda's books that has helped me the most is "listening to the sounds of the world". At times I focus in on just one sound that I randomly pick out and try to stay with it as long as possible, and keep coming back to it as I begin drifting back to thinking. At other times, I try to listen to everything at once in the same manner."

[QUOTE]

Listening to the sounds of the world is a good way to stop the internal dialogue. When your inner chatter returns, try listening to that in a detatched way as if it is independent of you, just like the other sounds around you. I think we give power to our inner talk by reacting to it, either in a positive or negative way.