In a previous article, Getting Hold of the Thoughts That Hold You Back, I promised to follow up with additional insights on the most profound of the four categories of thought that hold people back: The Inner Critic.
What is an inner critic?
As you’ll recall from that article, your inner critic is that voice in your head that tells you you’re “not enough,” “not worthy,” “not loveable.” It tells you there’s something “wrong” with you, that you’re “different” than other people, that no one really wants you or likes you – or could want you or like you – and you should basically just give up and not bother. “Don’t do that,” it says. “You’ll make a fool of yourself. What will people think?”
It’s easy to criticize and demonize the inner critic – after all, it generally doesn’t have many nice things to say – but in Getting Hold of the Thoughts That Hold You Back, I introduced the concept that your inner critic is actually trying to help you by keeping you safe. Have you ever noticed that while it might be a broken record inside your head, the volume goes up when you’re about to do something big or daring or (gasp!) vulnerable?
This may actually have a neurobehavioral foundation. Let’s take two facts:
- Emotional and physical pain activate similar regions in our brains (Alan Fogel summarizes this in a Psychology Today article), and
- Our brains are wired for fear-based learning: an event that would otherwise be neutral has negative emotional consequences, and our amygdala quickly learns to associate the two – and not only associate the two, but to generalize that fear to other similar stimuli. And even more interesting – it is far easier and quicker to learn that fear response and have it generalize than it is to unlearn it.
All of which means that your inner critic may actually be a very clever evolutionary way for your brain to anticipate bad emotional stuff happening (e.g., embarrassment, humiliation, rejection, shame) and to steer you away from whatever it is that might cause that (e.g., showing up as your whole, goofy self; taking an emotional risk; putting yourself out there without knowing if you’ll get it “right”).
Okay, great. We’ve all got a maladaptive “inner critic” trying to help us stay safe…and small…and invisible…and alone. Am I suggesting there’s a way to make friends with that? Yes! As always, my suggestion involves awareness, understanding, and compassion.
Awareness: What’s the underlying message?
There are several approaches to working with your inner critic. All of them start with identifying the underlying message, which can take many forms. Therapy and coaching are two modalities that dig down into what’s beneath these messages, to the essence of the “I’m not worthy” feelings underneath. Therapy helps you go back to the root of these thoughts and feelings to learn where they came from so you can heal, while coaching tends to focus more on acknowledging and articulating these thoughts and feelings so you can move forward.
It’s not always easy to distinguish the underlying message at first. You may be so accustomed to the broken record inside your head that it’s become part of your daily wallpaper.
Start to notice things like signs of anxiety in yourself: When you find yourself in a difficult conversation or about to do something that intimidates you, does your body tense up anywhere? Do you get butterflies in your stomach or chest? Does your breathing change? Do your palms feel sweaty? What is the voice inside your head saying to you in these moments?
Sometimes it helps to get those messages outside your head so you can see them for what they really are. You can take those messages and personify them like programmer Paul Ford did with his anxieties, as described in this 6.5-minute This American Life segment (go to Act Four), or you can simply write down those messages and change the “I” to “you” (e.g., “I am such a loser” becomes “You are such a loser”). This serves to externalize your inner critic and help give you some perspective.
Check in randomly with yourself throughout the day (set an alarm if it helps – a silent one on your phone, for example, just to remind you to be mindful). What are you feeling and thinking in this moment? What messages are you giving yourself? If they boil down to “You’re not okay,” you may be grappling with an inner critic.
Understanding: What’s the purpose?
Now, operating under the assumption that your inner critic has all the best intentions, but is perhaps not going about its goal in the most helpful of ways, you can start to do a little probing. Why was this particular “inner critic” message developed in the first place? Where did it come from (e.g., a parent, grandparent, teacher, friend; a particularly humiliating experience)? Even if you don’t remember exactly where it originated, what positive purpose might it be trying to serve? What does it want for you?
Often the answer is “to keep you small and safe.” Your inner critic doesn’t want you to feel embarrassed, humiliated, ashamed, weak, helpless, guilty, scared, foolish, or vulnerable.
Sometimes it helps to give your inner critic a name. Some people like to draw or sculpt it. You can even hold a conversation with it, taking the time to be curious about its true intentions and what motivates it, remembering to look for the positive, however misguided. Why is it showing up now? What do you think triggered it? How is it trying to protect you?
Compassion: Finding peace
Similar to the generalized fear response I mentioned earlier, the trouble is that the inner critic, while it may be appropriate in some instances, often becomes generalized into other situations where it is not appropriate and in fact holds you back from being your best and boldest self. As you become more aware of this, it is easy to get impatient or angry with your inner critic; however, this approach only fuels and perpetuates the same negativity that created the situation in the first place.
How about instead trying a kinder approach? Your inner critic wants a job. It wants to be of service. It wants to keep you safe and happy. But what do “safe” and “happy” actually look like? What if you could find your inner critic a new job to this end?
For example, with a learning mindset, every so-called “failure” is actually great data and feedback that can be used to inform your next decision or action. Rather than its role being to crush you so you don’t even try, give your inner critic the job of paying attention during a new experience and then seeking feedback and analyzing input so you can constantly learn and improve.
When your inner critic starts murmuring in your ear in a way that threatens to sap your energy or make you want to crawl under the covers, stop and listen for what it’s really saying. Maybe you need a moment to center yourself or to acknowledge that you’re scared. Thank your inner critic for drawing this to your attention and take the opportunity to be gentle with yourself while continuing on your path.
