How to Quiet Your Inner Critic
By: Jeff Valdivia
Tags: Self Improvement, Wellbeing, Self Doubt, Fear, Psychology

You know, that voice that’s telling you you’re worthless.

That voice. We’ve all heard it.

That insidious little bastard that gets into our heads and pollutes our thoughts and our actions.

It tells us we can’t do it. It tells us no one cares. It tells us to give up. It tells us to keep silent.

It destroys us. Moment after moment. Day after day.

Does it drive you crazy? Does it bring you to tears? Do you hate it?

We all have an inner critic. And whenever it decides to intervene in our lives, we wish it would just fuck off. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple.

You can’t wave a magic wand and make it disappear. You can, however, learn some practical tools for dialing down your inner critic’s piercing and debilitating voice. That’s the aim of this article.

Below are 5 steps you can take today to begin to dial down your inner critic. If that sounds good to you, let’s get started.

Step #1: Learn to identify when your inner critic is speaking

This one might seem obvious, but it’s more difficult than you think.

Typically, we identify with our thoughts. We claim them as “me”, “mine”, or “I”. So, when the inner critic speaks, we internalize those thoughts and we take them to be a truth about us. It can be a challenge to tease apart what we think about ourselves from what our inner critic is telling us.

Our first step, then, is to learn how to pinpoint the moments when our inner critic is speaking. To catch these moments, pay particular attention to when you’re feeling anxious, distracted, or numb. More generally, your inner critic has likely spoken whenever you perceive a shift in mood toward the negative.

Step #2: Change your inner critic’s thoughts

Once you’ve identified the thoughts belonging to your inner critic, you need to remind yourself that those thoughts don’t belong to you. So, if you think, “I’m too stupid to contribute to this conversation”, change the sentence to “My inner critic thinks, I’m too stupid to contribute to this conversation.”

This small change in how you think will provide a little bit of separation from your inner critic’s thoughts. In time, this separation will decrease your inner critic’s volume and influence.

Continue to do this with all your inner critic’s thoughts until it has become a habit.

Step #3: Have compassion for your inner critic

Now that you’re altering how your inner critic speaks to you, you need to investigate the situation. What is causing your inner critic to speak up? What is it afraid of? What is it ashamed of? What does it wish it could control?

In short, what are the authentic feelings underlying the inner critic’s voice?

Investigating the source of the inner critic’s harsh language will help you understand what it’s trying to accomplish. Usually, your inner critic is expressing fear, shame, or helplessness. In a fucked up sort of way, it’s actually trying to help you.

But, as you know, it’s not helping. It’s just making things worse. Unfortunately, your inner critic is a part of you — and it’s terrified.

So, instead of hating your inner critic, try to have some compassion for it. This is going to be hard because you know it’s just bringing you down. To generate some compassion for your inner critic, try to picture it as a scared child that doesn’t know how to deal with the situation except to lash out.

Use the investigation of your authentic feelings to relate to your inner critic. If you’re honest with yourself, your investigation will have uncovered some difficult emotions. It’s those emotions that your inner critic is reacting to. Agree with your inner critic that those are difficult emotions to deal with and reassure it that you’ll be OK.

In time, having compassion for your inner critic will do far more good than feeling hatred toward it.

Step #4: Write a more realistic explanation

Next, you want to create a new narrative for yourself — not a lie, but one that is closer to reality. If your inner critic said, “I’m too stupid to contribute to this conversation”, write down a more realistic description of the situation.

For example: although I often struggle to add value to conversations, I know this has more to do with my lack of confidence than my lack of intelligence.

We all struggle to put our best foot forward. Some of us more than others. The important point to recognize is that the harsh judgements of our inner critic are usually way off base. They exemplify our worst nightmares and darkest thoughts.

Writing down an alternative narrative helps us to see what happened in a more positive, hopeful, and productive light. But, again, it’s not about lying to ourselves — it’s about recognizing that our inner critic is distorting reality, so we need to do the work of establishing a more realistic perspective.

Step #5: Act in spite of your inner critic

When you’re inner critic rears its ugly head, we tend to cower in fear. This fearful reaction has become a habit through a lifetime of repetition. Our fear makes it seem impossible to change our reaction, and our inner critic wants to keep it that way.

Thankfully, we were all born with the antidote to our inner critic — bravery.

Each time you hear your inner critic, you have a choice — run away and hide or stand your ground. At first, standing your ground will seem impossible. You’ve spent a lifetime bending to the will of your inner critic. This is why we need to start small.

Are you scared of speaking up at a meeting? Start by asking a benign question.

Are you anxious about a piece of work or assignment? Break off a small chunk and start there.

Do you worry that no one will like you at the party? Narrow in on one person to have a chat with and go from there.

You will be amazed how even the smallest possible step — taken bravely— can change your outlook on life. It will make you realize that you’re not as trapped by the thinking of your inner critic as you think you are. And this will give you hope for the future.

Quiet your inner critic

We all have an inner critic and we all want it to go away. Thankfully, there are concrete steps we can take to help make that happen.

It will be easier for some of us and harder for others, but we can all do it. We just have to stick with it.

These tools and practices will help you quiet your inner critic: