3 Powerful Ways to Help Manage Your Inner Critic

Step 1. Notice When Your Inner Critic Shows Up

Cultivating awareness of your thoughts as they enter your mind is a skill that can be learned and takes practice.

• Awareness of your inner critic can start with slowing down the moment you are being self-critical. First, take a long, slow deep breath.
• Now shift your attention to your mind. Ask yourself: am I being self-critical right now? Or is my inner critic showing up?

Step 2. Get to Know Your Inner Critic

Different emotions have their own distinct patterns of thinking, feeling, and being. For example, have you noticed that when you are angry, you will think differently, emotionally feel different, and have different physical sensations in your body compared with when you are experiencing sadness, contentment, or anxiety?

So how do you get to know your inner critic? When you notice you are being self-critical, ask yourself:

• What is my critical self/inner critic saying to me? What tone of voice is it using?
• What is the emotion in the voice? Inner critics tend to be harsh, cold, disapproving, frustrated, angry, and contemptuous.
• What does it want? Is it critical to do something specific? For example, to protect you in some way, perhaps? To prevent you from doing something? Or to push you to succeed/not fail?

Step 3. Stop the Inner Critic Spiral

The extra step here is to bring in some compassionate understanding for yourself:

• What would I say to a friend or a young child in this situation? And can I say this to myself right now?
• How would I say it? (What tone of voice would I use?) Let me use that tone with myself right now...
• What would I do to help them? (What actions would I take?) How about I do ... and ... which will help me in this situation.

Read the complete article available at Psychology Today!

Reflection:

How do you silence your inner critic?

#InnerCritic #Self-esteem #Self-talk

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