* Draw your inner critic. This is not an art project and no one will mark you on this. Drawing inner critic externalizes it and helps you to separate from it. What or who does inner critic look like?

* Think about when and how your inner critic developed. Does it sound like any one you know?

* Write down both of your parents’, and anyone else’s, critical messages and compare them to your list. Have you adopted any one else’s critical messages as your own? Separating from inner critic can sometimes be accomplished by saying to yourself, “Ah, yes, that’s what my mother would have said.”

* Meditation is very helpful for stepping back and observing inner critic, and any other part of yourself.

Acknowledging Parts of Yourself That You’ve Disowned

Inner critics have a tendency to feed on very aspects of ourselves that we are most uncomfortable with, deny, and disown. For example, if you are uncomfortable with your anger and your critical judgments of other people, tell yourself that you don’t feel angry when you do, and think that you are not being mean when you are, your inner critic will rake you over coals and call you a cruel bitch! If you acknowledge your anger and reality that sometimes you do think or speak critically of other people, your inner critic has nothing to hit you with.

How we feel about our bodies, or parts of our bodies, can be harder. If you have an inner critic that tells you that you are “fat”, you likely don’t accept your body as it is and would prefer that you weighed less or looked differently. While it may be hard to accept your body way it is, you can try acknowledging to yourself that this is your body and this is way you look with as little judgment as possible.

Some people find it helpful to acknowledge that indeed they do have fat on their body, and so what. For more help with this issue, see my article called, Changing Our Body Image

Becoming aware of and acknowledging all aspects of yourself, including parts you are not comfortable with, softens inner critic’s power.

Some ways to get to know different aspects of yourself that you disown include:

* Think of somebody whom you really dislike, somebody who pushes your emotional buttons, and leaves you feeling self-righteous and superior. Don’t pick someone who has abused you. What is it about this person that you judge? Once you figure that out, you’ve found a disowned aspect of yourself. For example, say you dislike someone because she is needy and wants others to take care of her. You would never want to be like that! That is your disowned self - needy child who wants others to take care of her/him.

* Think about someone you overvalue. This is someone who you not only admire, but someone with whom you feel bad about yourself in comparison. Again you will have found a disowned self. Perhaps, you admire a friend’s ability to be rational and in control. You, in contrast, always seem to be emotional and confused. You wish you could be calm, cool, and collected like she is. In fact, around her you may get even more confused and emotional, and have great difficulty pulling your thoughts together. She is showing you a disowned self. You have disowned your own rational, controlled part. (Stone and Stone, 1993)

One of inner critic’s jobs is to criticize your disowned parts, so by acknowledging all of you who you are, you reduce power of inner critic.

Dialoguing With The Inner Critic

Dialoguing with an inner critic can be helpful too. The traditional approach to dealing with inner critics is to try and talk them out of what they think, but this can soon become a no- win situation. Even if you manage to prove to an inner critic error of it’s ways, it will simply move on to another thing about you to criticize.

Gently countering inner critics views can help. But, sometimes it helps more to view inner critic as another part of yourself who has something of value to say and deserves to be heard and respected. Dialoguing with inner critic (for example, writing out a conversation between inner critic and another part of yourself) where you simply listen, ask clarifying questions, understand inner critic’s deeper concerns, offer feedback as you would in any conversation, and negotiate agreements if that fits often softens inner critic more and has longer lasting results.

The next time you hear a voice inside of you putting you down, take a deep breath, remind yourself it’s your inner critic speaking, take a step back, and observe it in action. That may be all you need to do to reduce impact of inner critic. You may want to listen for potential disowned parts as well that you can try to acknowledge. For more we acknowledge all of who we are, and how we can behave, less powerful inner critic is, and that is such a relief!

References:

Embracing Your Inner Critic - Turning Self-Criticism into a Creative Asset by Hal Stone & Sidra Stone, HarperSanFrancisco, 1993.

Regardless of what we believe to be at root of this constant wanting, it seems to take conscious and deliberate effort to experience contentment or satisfaction in our lives — to fully appreciate life, people, and activities we engage in. And, this doesn't mean appreciating things that are hurtful, wrong, or violent, because that would reflect not fully appreciating ourselves or other people.

Instead, it means taking a new look at ourselves, life, and world around us and seeing beauty that is there. It doesn't mean ignoring what isn't right, like violence in our and other countries, but it also doesn't mean denying good we do see.

It means getting in touch with awe of a child who see magic in everything, who notices simplest of things and takes great pleasure in them. It means appreciating and valuing yourself, people you know, what you've done, and what you are doing. It means slowing down and savouring every moment, or as many moments as possible rather than hurrying along to next task.

By noticing more, and by appreciating what is good in their lives (like glass full of fresh clean water), many people find that they begin to feel more content — they find what they were searching for all along.