Most people think their inner critic is a necessary nuisance. But you outgrew its messages by the time you were 17. It’s a terrible motivator, an imaginary idiot, and it curates all your conflicts and anxieties. All of them. After ten years of working with hundreds of people on taming their inner critics, here is a thumbnail sketch of what we talk about.
The voice isn’t deep inside you. It’s not part of your subconscious self. If you search for it, you’ll notice that it whispers to you from near the surface, not from your recesses. That’s because it mediates the authentic self’s interactions with the outside world.
It’s a bully. Using the inflections of an absent parent, it constantly reminds you that you’re not fully equipped to succeed in the world, and urges you to be meek.
It always exaggerates social danger.
It tells you lies: that you’re a wounded six-year-old, that love is transactional and must be pursued, and that your worth is dependent on how others see you.
It does not have your best interests in mind. After it has finished its work of teaching you the basics (right/wrong, good/bad, safety), and having run out of new ideas, the inner critic’s only interest is its own survival. To stay in charge, it has to continually persuade you that you are a child in a world of adults.
You are a better decisionmaker than your inner critic. You are a sophisticated adult who is perfectly moral. Being moral just means you know what’s right; it doesn’t mean you always do what you know is right. The inner critic repeating slogans fit for children is not helpful in any way.
The inner critic tells you that you have made bad decisions. In fact, when you made that decision, you performed a proper risk/benefit computation. Based on the information you had, you made a choice between two good options. Because we’re deciding in murky waters, without visibility into all the variables, some choices go sideways. It wasn’t a bad decision. It was a decision that went sideways.
If you’re reading this, you have a perfect record at adjusting to misfortune. So does everybody around you. Overcoming obstacles isn’t a big deal. My superpower isn’t achievement. My superpower is adaptation. So is yours. So is every human’s. Not something my inner critic wants me to hear.
Fortunately, the inner critic is a vampire. It only succeeds in the dark of night, hidden from sight. It whispers subvocally. But if I stop and play back what it’s saying, bringing it to the light of day, the inner critic weakens. I notice that I have been taking direction from the dumbest bully in the back of the class.
What if I’m fine already? What if I can lay off the self-improvement and notice how productive, how satisfied, how clear-eyed I can be when the inner critic’s harsh judgments get put to the side?
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