Talking to your inner critic, can it be tamed?

[quirkywords]

Do you have an inner critic ? Have you ever tried to talk to your inner critic. This is what happened when I tried. In my Be yourself thread people asked about how I interviewed my inner critic. So here it is.

This is adapted from a writing exercise to interview your inner critic about one's writing. As my inner critic has an opinion all aspects of my life I decided to broaden the scope of the interview.

Me: I welcome (well I don't really) this opportunity to find out why you always need to have an opinion that is always negative about me and my life.

IC: I thought this was going to be a friendly interchange of ideas but there you go with your anger and hostile remarks. I do not see myself as negative but as helping you, because you do need help.

I am here to help you why can't you see that?

Me: So when I am trying to sleep and you tell me about all my mistakes, embarrassing moments, how does that help me?

IC: I thought while you are in bed you would have time to consider some of your past behaviours. This I feel will only help you to improve.

Me: If you are so helpful why do I feel so worthless, so sad, so ignorant when you are around? Do you really know how low I can feel when you are constantly telling me all my faults?

IC: You make yourself feel that way- I am merely pointing out the truth. It is not my problem that you are so weak.

Me: Maybe this was a bad idea you are never going to listen to me or understand me.

IC: Have you ever thought that maybe you shouldn't listen to me if I upset you so much.

Me How can I ignore you when you are so loud at times.

IC: See this is what I mean you are so weak. You have the power to ignore me, to silence me but all you do is whinge and complain.

Me: I am ending this interview. Enough is enough.

What would you say to your inner critic and what do you want to hear from your inner critic? Maybe you can have a go at interviewing your inner critic.

Quirky

[Ggrand]

Hello Quirkey, MF and all,

Quirky it sounds like your beginning to tame you inner critic, Keep doing what your doing...

My inner critic I have names for mine...Jessica my harsh and most frequent visitor to me....Jessy....my soft caring inner critic, an extremely scarce visitor to me...

Jessica is a constant companion with me throughout my life, Telling me all sorts of things I’m not capable of doing...and Jessie will pop her head in occasionally and say yes you can....

The inner battle that goes on between these two can at times take days for a winner to emerge..Usually Jessica, strong, persistent, and stubborn wins the long battle and poor Jessie retreats hides back inside me too tired to be bothered to fight Jessica for a long while and takes a really long holiday.... Being the winner and with Jessie being to tired and deflated to fight another battle for a while...Jessica is getting more stronger and more louder and is usually just sitting right next to my ear ready to pounce and let me know in no uncertain terms that she is Jessica the know it all, the boss.... and she isn’t shy about letting me know about it..

Grandy..

[quirkywords]

Grandy and everyone,

I must admit was quite upset by the way Jessica treats you and I can relate to that.

On the forum you always appear so confident when advising and caring others. Does Jessica know much we all value your competency here and many help have really learnt from your wisdom and been helped by your compassion and patience.

I had a lightbulb moment when earlier in this year someone close to me really upset by a comment and it took me a while recover. Then I thought , I say worse things to myself every day through my critic, so how can I complain about some one else saying something not as mean.!!

Does that make sense?

I get upset when others say negative comments to me that are not as bad as ones I use on myself.

It made me think and I try to remember how bad I feel when others are mean when I am mean to myself.

Quirky

[Quercus]

Hi everyone,

Quirky you mentioned how we feel hurt when someone gives us negative comments and yet we accept the cruel comments we give to ourselves.

I think external feedback hurts badly because my critic uses it as proof. Proof I am as useless/awful as she says I am.

I'm trying to build my ability to validate myself and my worth rather than rely on others to show I matter. It is too much of a risk to let feedback in. The critic takes it and runs amok.

[quirkywords]

hello everyone

Nat exactly external feedback that is negative just gives our critic more excuses to criticise us.

i too try to validate myself and build myself up but I still find it hard when I get external, harsh unwanted comments.

I think it depends on my moods to if I can cope with external feedback or not.

I think I have said this before but I was brought up not to brag or boast so saying positive things about myself which we now call self esteem seems like I am full of myself. old habits are hard to break.

nat thanks for your insights, I feel the more we talk about these issues the more we thinks about the. It helps us wori out why we do what we do.

Quirky

[Quercus]

Hi Quirky,

Ah now that is an interesting topic too... Self esteem vs arrogance.

I agree totally about being raised not to boast. Accepting compliments was (and is at times) a work in progress.

And yet I wonder is arrogance a bad thing?

My husband is confident and at peace within himself. People often see him as arrogant and standoffish and at times rude. But his confidence in his self worth and right to respect himself has always been so attractive to me.

It feels good to know he does not NEED my validation but wants my respect and love. And curiously enough I've noticed a pattern...

When my critic is wearing me down and I try to appease others and keep the peace he gets endlessly annoyed. Yet when I am feeling well and demanding to be myself and at times arguing and disagreeing with him he is happier.

It makes me wonder... Is it always a bad thing to be arrogant if it helps keep the critic at bay?

[White_Rose]

Hello Natalie and everyone

It's good to have an inner critic at times because this can help us evaluate what we are doing. It's when the IC gets out of line that we are in trouble. It's a hard thing to do, separate the necessary critic from the abusive one. Grandy I love your Jessica/Jessy. That's exactly what I mean.

On the wall in my kitchen I have various poems/quotes/songs which I can read every time I come and go from the kitchen. I have put up comments written to me from people on BB. Not a huge amount. My criterion for putting anything on the wall is that it helped me at the time. These bits of paper remind me when I walk past that I have done some things well, or that life will be a series of ups and downs, or a reminder of how I have coped in the past and some reassurance that not being perfect is OK.

Nat, it's not arrogance at work, it's the real you wanting to live a good life free from as much trouble as possible. I think when we accuse ourselves of being arrogant or any other similar words it's like running the same rat run through the maze. Even the word gives me shivers as I do not want to become arrogant.

I believe that we are taught in our various childhoods to be modest etc as you and Quirky have identified. So to call yourself arrogant is another way of putting ourselves down. When you argue with your husband it is healthy and comes from your own self esteem, a self-recognition that you have opinions and have the right to voice them. Discussion and different viewpoints is what leads to respect and on a larger scale changes the world.

State your case clearly and listen to the reply. Not a jot of arrogance there, simply a good and strong relationship. It will do more towards getting rid of your Jessica than trying to push the thoughts away which is an exhausting process regardless of the success or not of getting it out of our heads.

Work on all the good parts of you and make them stronger however small or even unrecognised. More constructive and less hard work than arguing with your brain. The brain is a lazy organ in many ways, always wanting to take the easy path, not to change the status quo no matter that it and you will feel better.

Good to see you writing Nat.

Mary

[quirkywords]

hello everyone,

Nat,

Thanks for your thoughts. it is funny I have ne er used the word arrogance as I associate that with something else I suppose it was more bragging and being boastful, sounding one’s own trumpet that I was brought up to avoid.

I think it is interesting that when you are standing up for yourself that your husband likes that part of you.

Mary,

i always find your comments give me a lot to think about. I sometimes think about cutting and pasting when people have said nice things to me online but never get around to it, yet I do recall negative things people say to me all the time!

I don’t think I could have notes where other people can see them but I have thought mod putting them in a book. It is funny how I have no problem in endlessly repeating negative comments some from decades ago but thought of putting up kind words up where I can se them seems so difficult.

I still have a lot to work on.

thanks everyone for your input into this discussion.

I wonder if anyone can remember a time when their inner critic was not around or has it been there since as long as you can remember?

Quirky b

[Elizabeth CP]

To me there is a huge difference between arrogance & confidence.

Arrogance is pushing yourself forward or your opinions forward in a way that puts others down. An arrogant person puts out the image they are better than anyone else. Not a nice characteristic.

Confidence & self-esteem come from believing we are worthwhile & we have a strong belief in our opinions. A confident person believes they have something valuable to contribute to society & they will do their best to follow this through so they are good to be around because we can trust them. They also accept that other people are different to them & may have different opinions but they are able to accept differences without any negative feelings.

When we lack confidence (I'm guilty of this) we tend to try to fit into other peoples expectations but that means other people have difficulty knowing what we really want which has a negative impact on relationships.

I too wish I could control my harsh critic which has been around since I was a child. I don't think it was present in England but since moving here & being bullied it has been present. Sometimes it is stronger than others.

[quirkywords]

Hello everyone,

Thanks Elizabath. I agree about the difference between confidence and arrogance. I was thinking about how was brought up to believe that if one said I am good at this or that that would not be confidence but would mean they were bragging or boastful. That is how people saw self esteem and confidence back then. Confidence, self esteem and arrogance were seen as interchangeable.

Times have changed but my brain is stuck back in those days.

So what made your inner critic be silent while you were in England?

Quirky

[Elizabeth CP]

I lived in England until I was 5 1/2. My memories are of loving parents, having fun with my friends & feeling I was accepted by everyone around me. While living in the migrant hostel in Australia I was bullied by my peers. At home with my family I felt safe & loved but outside I knew no-one liked me so I must be unlikeable & felt scared. I remember hiding in the classroom at lunch time because I was so scared of the other students. I was often bashed on my way to & from school. I never told my parents probably because I didn't want them to realise what a terrible person I was!!!

These feelings have plagued me the rest of my life. Sometimes worse than others.