Can you change your relationship with your inner critic?

What are you hardest on yourself about? Maybe you’re always late, or struggle to fall asleep because you binge watch a show, or scroll social media. Maybe you procrastinate and let chores or work pile up. What is it that puts your critical part into overdrive, and makes you feel bad about yourself?

It seems that when we make the same “mistakes” or fall back into old behavior patterns again and again, our inner critical voice jumps in to let us know all the ways we could have and should have done things differently or better.

Our inner critic usually triggers a lot of feelings of guilt and shame, too, and that adds to our burden and our distress.

It’s hard to admit, but I can be really hard on myself when I’m feeling anxious. I tell myself that I’m the anxiety “expert.” How can I feel anxious if I’m the one who’s supposed to help others? My inner critic jumps in to point out all the ways I should be ashamed for feeling anxious.

As you can imagine, that inner dialog doesn’t ease my anxiety!

Can we find another way?

What if we could do things differently? What if we could change our relationship with ourselves, and make it a habit to be kinder, gentler, more fiercely protective of ourselves?

I recently talked with Kristin Neff and Michelle Glass on the podcast about self-compassion and working with our parts.

In my conversation with Michelle, she shared that all our parts—even our inner critic—have good intentions, but, depending on our history, those parts may have become more reactive and extreme. That can make it hard to understand exactly what those good intentions are.

Kristin shared that as she learned to work with and listen to her critical part, she could meet it with self-compassion. Through her self-compassion practice, her inner critical part became less reactive and extreme.

During the conversation, Kristin reminded us that when we offer ourselves compassion instead of criticism, we’re working to relieve our suffering, not give ourselves a pass for bad behavior. She added that self-compassion is a radical act of kindness, not a form of self-pity.

We’re not telling ourselves that it’s okay to hurt others, or to make mistakes, or stay up too late when we need the rest. Instead, we’re recognizing that because we’re human we err, we feel all kinds of feelings, and we make mistakes all the time.  Instead of offering criticism when things don’t go perfectly, we’re offering ourselves comfort for how hard it is when we stumble.

When we can pause, and acknowledge how hard it is when we don’t get things right and how bad it makes us feel, and we offer compassion instead of beating ourselves over the head in punishment for our mistakes, we begin to break the critical spiral, and a new, kinder relationship with ourselves begins to blossom.

What self-compassion might look like in practice

I’m learning that when I work so hard to make everyone else happy, I get anxious, because I’ve forgotten to check in with my own needs. It’s an old pattern that’s hard to shake. Today I recognize that my anxious part is my reminder that I’ve left my needs untended or ignored. When I can meet myself there, with compassion for how hard it is not to fall back into those old patterns, I can make steps to take care of me. Doing that quiets the inner critic and eases my anxiety in the moment.

As with all new behaviors and new paths, a self-compassion practice takes practice. The old paths are worn and well used, so forging a new way of being takes time and consistency to develop. I believe these new paths take us back to our heart, our home, our authentic selves.

We all have the ability to make changes within—but it takes time, so be patient and kind to yourself on this journey to a new relationship with yourself.

If you’d like to take that first step down this new path, to shift your patterns and cycles of self-criticism and self-doubt, let’s talk!

Photo by @zackography—Unsplash