When Taylor first contacted me for a coaching session, she said she thought she needed just a little help staying focused. She sent her business website address along with her inquiry email. She was a photographer, and the photo on her “About” page showed a woman with warm brown eyes and a wide smile. She had recently gone through some major transitions. Within a year, she had married, bought a new home, and changed careers from banking to being a self-employed freelance wedding photographer.
Change was everywhere in Taylor’s life, and she was struggling with how intense it all felt. As it turned out, help with staying focused was only part of what was going on. We began our work together and started to hone in on what Taylor really wanted, and she immediately started using the tool of accessing the body. After a few coaching sessions, Taylor had done some self-investigation into her predominant fear routine.
“Pessimist,” she said, reporting back after having done some Courage Habit exercises between our calls. “I hate admitting that, but that’s what I see. Every single time something doesn’t go smoothly, I just want to give up. I feel like it’s impossible. If we find some new repair that didn’t turn up on the inspection report when we bought the house, I immediately want to throw in the towel and say that we never should have bought the house. Or, if someone I talked to about getting portraits done ends up not calling back, I just want to check out and watch television.”
When Taylor went into a Pessimist headspace, she felt sure that nothing could be counted upon to work out, and since nothing was going to work out anyway, she might as well do something else. Of course, this mind-set only made things harder, and every time she “checked out” with the temporary reward of a Grey’s Anatomy binge, she’d feel better for a few hours, but later she would feel stressed and disappointed in herself because she hadn’t worked on her business.
Taylor had taken a big risk stepping away from salaried employment and into a career that she was truly excited about. (This risk I could relate to!) If she wanted to feel resilient in the face of change or make progress toward her dream of being a professional photographer, Taylor would have to become aware of the times she goes into Pessimist routines, because they were undermining her at every turn.
To do that, our work started with the first step of the Courage Habit. In stopping to access her body, Taylor began to recognize the sensations of fear that acted like cues, such as a fearful brain-fog that caused her to feel anxious and trip over her words when she was on the phone with a potential client. Accessing the body as a regular practice helped her to recognize what was happening in the moment. It also helped her feel more grounded during client calls.
Taylor was making great strides in the right direction, but she still struggled after setbacks. She noticed something that she hadn’t paid as much attention to before: a persistent, critical inner voice that was always there to tell Taylor that she didn’t have what it took to run a business. “Of course that client didn’t hire you. What made you think you could run a business, anyway? You’re a hobby photographer, not a professional.” No matter how many times Taylor tapped into her body to try to make that inner critical voice go away, it just wouldn’t stay silent.
Taylor isn’t the only one who gets stuck when that inner voice of criticism or pessimism pipes up. We all have these critical inner voices, and I’m not talking about schizophrenia or a psychological disorder. These critical voices are the internalized voices of criticism—blame, judgment, condescension, defeat, put-downs, and downplaying or abandoning progress. In other words, it’s how we talk to ourselves when we don’t feel capable or when we’re feeling “less than.” These voices often parallel those of the people who raised us, a dominant group that projects stereotypes onto the gender or culture that we are part of, or our fear routines. (Perfectionist critical voices, for instance, will push for more perfection, while Pessimist critical voices will say that there’s no point in trying). I call these collective internalized voices the “Inner Critic” or just the “Critic,” because it’s a neutral term that objectively labels what these voices are doing.
Think you don’t have a Critic? I’d urge you to reconsider that. All too often, the denial of the Critic’s existence means that the Critic is exerting even more power over someone’s life. In her research into people’s experiences of shame, Dr. Brenè Brown found that the more someone denied feeling any shame, the more shame was at work in his or her life. Working directly with hundreds of clients, retreat participants, and workshop trainees for more than a decade, I’ve found the same to be true with the denial of the Critic. Absolutely everyone has one, even the most confident people you know. The more that people insist that they have no critical voices or that they’re “in control” of those voices, the more those voices run them in circles, and they don’t even realize it.
In the last chapter, you learned about the first step of the Courage Habit: accessing the body. You now know how to recognize fear sensations that might cue a fear routine. With body-based practices that you can use when you notice fear or self-doubt taking over, you can slow down enough to take the next step in the Courage Habit: listening without attachment. In this chapter, you’ll learn about more effective approaches to work with those Inner Critic voices, rather than avoiding or fighting against them. You’ll start to relate to your Inner Critic in a new way that diffuses its ability to intimidate you right when you’re going after a big dream and bringing your most courageous self to light.
Many people start out like Taylor did, detached from their Inner Critic voices, relegating them to the background noise of their lives until they don’t even notice them anymore. It was when Taylor started to tune in to her body that she became aware of this voice, and that’s when she realized she needed a new way of responding to this voice, rather than ignoring it or telling it to go away. Wanting to avoid your Critic or tell it to go away is understandable, because tuning in to what the Critic says is challenging and stressful. Karen Horney, a pioneering feminist psychologist, theorized that people respond to relationship stress by trying to get their needs met in one of three ways: detachment, compliance, or aggression.
We try to survive our interactions with the Inner Critic in the same ways. I call it avoiding, pleasing, and attacking. When people are avoiding dealing with their Critic, as Saboteurs or Pessimists do, they’re trying to tune out the Critic’s words. They might do this through procrastination (putting off or rationalizing waiting to take action), distraction (through overwork, turning to alcohol or other chemicals), or resistance to following through (such as not using tools that could help them, like practicing the Courage Habit regularly).
Pleasing the Critic, which is common for Perfectionists and Martyrs, translates as trying harder to “do it right,” whatever “it” is, so that the Critic won’t have anything to say. For example, if a Perfectionist’s Critic says that she needs to be better, she responds by doubling down her efforts, with the logic that if she is better, the Critic will be satisfied. The problem? The Critic is never satisfied. Martyrs who want to keep the peace and be noticed for their efforts, follow the same path of trying to please the Critic so that it will leave them alone, yet they meet the same result.
Attacking the Critic is arguing with it or responding to its voice aggressively. It’s fighting back with words, such as “What do you know, anyway?” or “Shut up,” or “Fuck off.” Pinterest graphics with messages, such as “Today’s the day I kick fear’s ass” fall into this category. Just about everyone, when they feel like they’ve hit their limit with the internal abuse, will have at least some moment where they try attacking the Critic. While fighting back can give you a rush of feeling more powerful or in control, this too is ultimately exhausting and futile. After all, telling your Critic to go away has not made it go away forever, has it? Instead of doing the things we’ve done before that are only temporarily helpful, we need to find new ways of relating to the Critic that go beyond attacking back and being locked in a battle.
Let’s begin the process by considering how you’ve been responding to your Critic. What do you find yourself doing most often? Do you tend to avoid, please, or push? Can you find any concrete evidence that avoiding, pleasing, or attacking is a sustainable or effective strategy for the rest of your life? Use the Courage Habit step of accessing the body to really pause, breathe, and honestly answer these questions.
If the idea of being in conflict with this Critic voice for the rest of your life sounds exhausting or unappealing, then there’s some good news. Learning to listen without attachment to the Critic will be the game changer. When you’re feeling pulled into the fears of the Critic, slowing down to listen without attachment prepares you to tune in and really listen to what your Critic is saying. You’re directly facing that fearful voice within.
“Listening without attachment is very conscious,” I told Taylor the day that we talked about adding this second step to her practice of accessing the body. “You’re listening to the Critic’s actual words, which is—no lie—uncomfortable. But, you’re not just listening. You’re listening without attachment. You’re consciously deciding not to get attached to what the Critic says. I compare it to if you encountered a drunk person on the street who was insisting that you’re a bad person. You might hear the words the person was saying, but you’d ultimately decide not to lend any authority to his words.”
Taylor had spent a long time tuning out her Critic, and it had never worked. To shift her old fear patterns, she needed to stop avoiding, pleasing, or attacking her Critic and start listening, but doing so intentionally without giving power to the Critic.
To investigate the Critic, we’ve got to do what most of us, like Taylor, avoid for as long as possible: listen to what the Critic has to say. That’s how we lay the groundwork for seeing how critical voices operate. For the exercise that follows, I strongly encourage you to write down your answers. (You can also download a worksheet for this “Investigating the Critic” exercise at the website for this book at http://www.yourcourageouslife.com/courage-habit.) When I work with a coaching client, we complete this exercise together. You could answer these questions on your own or with a partner, coach, therapist, or friend.
As you write down your answers, it’s important that you capture exactly what the Critic says and how it sounds. For instance, instead of writing “I’m afraid of failing,” write what your Critic says to you when you fear failure, the way that the voice sounds in your head: “Who do you think you are?” “You’ll never finish this.” “Someone else has already done it, better.” Capturing the Critic’s exact words is important for how we will pull apart its influence in later exercises.
After you write down everything that you can think of, there’s an important final piece to complete the exercise. Revisit the first part of the Courage Habit process, accessing the body, using whichever approach you found most helpful. (In other words, take some time to dance, cry, breathe slowly, take a walk, or otherwise tune in to your body.) Without exception, everyone who really goes into this exercise with their whole heart will find it challenging to listen to their fearful inner voices. Take care of yourself so that you can get to the other side of any fears that have limited your life, rather than getting stuck in this part of the process. Accessing the body becomes a tool to lean on so that you don’t unconsciously go into a fear routine.
The reason so many of us avoid dealing with our Critic is now written down on a piece of paper in front of you. The voice of the Critic is messy, often mean, and it can be extremely difficult to face those thoughts and feelings at once. Remember, these are just words on paper. These words don’t have to “mean” anything about you or your life. By writing down the Critic’s words, and then deciding to access the body rather than avoid, please, or attack, you’re already starting to reroute the cue-routine-reward process that would have pulled you back into old, fear-based habits. It’s this practice of listening intently, but without giving authority to the Critic or doing what it says, that’s so important to shifting the power the Critic has. Now, you stand poised to untangle yourself from getting stuck.
As Taylor began listening to and writing down exactly what her Critic said, she began to see why it had been so tempting to try to ignore it entirely. She noticed that her Critic wasn’t only showing up as belittling or sarcastic. Sometimes her Critic would shape-shift, always expecting more of her or suddenly turning the tables when she least expected it. Taylor’s Critic could work both sides of an argument like a master. If she worked hard to market her photography business, the Critic insisted that she should have worked harder. Other times, when she did work harder and really put herself out there, she found herself stressed out, overwhelmed, and getting sick. That’s when the Critic would twist its message and say that Taylor worked too much, her life was out of balance, and that her sickness was evidence that she’d never make self-employment sustainable.
Taylor also noticed that her Critic could be downright vicious. As she tuned in more, she truly struggled because she felt nervous on client calls and didn’t quite know what to do when she heard the Critic say, in a tone of condescension and disgust, “How is a client ever going to hire you if you sound like a nervous idiot on the phone?” Even more confusing were the times when the Critic used logical reasoning to undermine her, such as when Taylor connected with other professional photographers and her Critic casually and calmly pointed out, “Their websites are better and they’re always going to get more clients. Let’s be honest: you aren’t even in their league. Don’t go getting your hopes up.”
When we are untangling from the power that our Critic voices hold over us, we all do this dance with competing voices, and things get confusing. What is the difference between a logical-yet-malicious Critic and our own common sense about right and wrong? After all, Taylor wondered, wasn’t it true that clients wouldn’t hire her if she “sounded like an idiot” on the phone? Wasn’t it true that a better website would be more likely to result in getting more clients? If her Critic wasn’t being loud and aggressive in pointing this out to her, wouldn’t she just get complacent? Would she be motivated to change without this voice?
I could relate to this confusion, because when I’d first started to unhook from my own Perfectionist routine, it had been difficult for me to tell the difference between my own internal standards of excellence versus the striving standards of my Critic. How could I know the difference between pushing myself in a way that was healthy, versus striving for endless perfection?
To distinguish the difference between yourself and your Critic, there are two things to notice. First, notice how the voice of the Critic mirrors your fear routines. For example, the Critic showing up as a Perfectionist is solely focused on the result yet is never truly satisfied, whereas healthy striving for a goal involves taking time to reflect and appreciate hard work throughout the process. The Martyr sees the pleased look on people’s faces and takes that as validation that sacrificing her own ambitions (yet again) was worth it, whereas someone practicing interdependence will give as generously to herself as she does to others. The Pessimist really does think she sees all the evidence for why nothing will work out after one small disappointment, and the person who puts disappointment in its proper context feels what’s real without turning feelings into evidence that nothing else is possible. The Saboteur buries her head in the sand when she’s not following through on a commitment yet again, but someone who’s self-aware will notice that constantly moving on to the next thing isn’t in her long-term best interest.
The second thing you can notice is where you end up when you ask yourself “Is this helpful?” Is the internal voice offering information or insight that’s truly helpful? How do you feel when you hear this internal voice? Do you feel energized when you think about what this voice is saying? Does the voice offer you information that helps you to work through what you’re facing? If not, it’s probably the voice of the Critic.
Sometimes people tell me that they can’t tell the difference between what’s really their Critic versus who they truly are. They’ve been listening to the Critic voices for so long that they feel cut off from their intuition and authentic self, which makes untangling the voices so intimidating and frustrating that they want to throw up their hands. This is an extremely common response to this work, and I’d invite you to dig deep and trust the process, even if all the untangling doesn’t happen after one exercise. When it’s extremely difficult to tell the difference between the Critic and the “real you,” this means that a process called “fusion” has taken place. Fusion, which comes from acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), is what has happened when we believe that what we think is synonymous with who we are, and we behave accordingly. As therapist Steven Hayes puts it, “Fusion means getting caught up in our thoughts and allowing them to dominate our behavior” (2009). In those moments when your Critic tells you that something isn’t possible or can’t or shouldn’t be done, and you believe the voice and act on it, you’re “fused” with the Critic.
Nearly all of us are fused with our Critics, until we stop to ask ourselves what the Critic is saying. As you get more practice with the Courage Habit step of listening without attachment, it gets easier to recognize the difference between the “real you” and the Critic’s punishing standards. As I would remind any client, be gentle with yourself when it seems “too big” to parse, and remember that your old habits took time to create, and they will take time to undo. Keep integrating the Courage Habit step of accessing the body, and every time you get stuck make sure that you pause to cry the tears, punch the air in frustration, dance vigorously to get the blood flowing, or slow down and breathe.
Taylor’s question about how to tell the difference between herself and the Critic was answered as soon as I asked her about her fear routine. “Usually, when we take a healthy break from something, we feel rejuvenated in some way. When you go into the fear routine of the Pessimist and stop working toward your goals, does that nourish you?” I asked.
“Nourish me? No, I wouldn’t call it that. It’s more of that checking out feeling,” Taylor said. For Taylor to tell the difference between who she really was versus what her Critic was saying, Taylor turned to what she had already uncovered about her Pessimist fear routine, which was all about giving up when things got tough. Giving up never gave her the sort of rejuvenating break that left her feeling rested and ready to be even more of her most courageous self. I also encouraged Taylor to access the body when she took breaks to see what she felt internally. Taylor found that when she took breaks from work because she was in her Pessimist routine, she’d feel a sensation of just wanting to “check out,” and taking a break under those conditions never refueled her.
Consider which fear routine you identified with in Chapter 2: Martyr, Pessimist, Perfectionist, or Saboteur. The description of each routine included some examples of what you’re likely to say to yourself when you’re in the middle of that fear routine. Those examples are in fact examples of the voices of the Critic. Do you see the connection between what your Critic says to you, and how that perpetuates that fear routine? Pause and take time to write in a journal or on a piece of paper anything that seems particularly significant.
I’ve been talking about the fact that the Critic exists and you’ve been exploring how yours shows up, but we haven’t yet looked at the questions that dogged me for the longest time. Why is the Critic so caught in a fear routine? Why isn’t stopping the Critic just as simple as telling it to go away, or refusing to pay attention to it? Logically it seems like it should be that simple, but in practice it never is.
The answers to these questions start with revisiting what we know about the basal ganglia and cue-routine-reward. Remember that with the cue-routine-reward, we feel the cue of fear, and the basal ganglia prompts us to move into whichever routine gets us to the fastest “reward” of reduced tension. When Taylor’s Critic berated her, its voice was dysfunctional and stress inducing. But, for Taylor, the Critic’s voice was never as stress inducing as actually taking action toward her big dream. That big dream was new, uncertain, and therefore a bigger deal because it was emotionally riskier. Every time Taylor backed down and checked out, she got her temporary “reward” of reduced tension. To stop getting stuck in the same cycle, she needed to keep coming back to the essential work of slowing down to access the body, remember that her Pessimist fear routine might be at work, and make a conscious choice to listen in to what the Critic was saying. Consistently practicing each piece of the Courage Habit in tandem was essential.
Your fear routine might be different than Taylor’s, but it will play out the same way. For example, when I felt fear, I went into my Perfectionist fear routine, which drove me to overwork. While it was stressful when my perfectionist Critic would berate me, it was still more familiar to do what the Critic said, because that’s what I was used to doing. Our fear routines are habituated and will always feel, at the beginning, more comfortable to turn to than trying something entirely new.
Here’s the big “secret” about the Critic: The Critic is invested in a fear routine, and it won’t go away just because we want it to. It thinks that by criticizing you it’s protecting you.
Underneath the condescension, shape-shifting, malicious logic, yelling, berating, and intimidation, the Critic is, in fact, scared. It’s scared of change and it’s scared of doing things differently. It’s scared of living differently, experiencing rejection, and dealing with failure. The Critic is not out to get you. It’s wounded and it’s trying to protect you from future wounding. It’s from that wounded place of fear that the Critic starts to criticize you, hoping that if you stay in the old, familiar routines, you’ll be safe from any harm.
I still remember how I felt the day that my coach, Matthew Marzel, suggested his own alternative interpretation of the Critic: “It’s your best friend with lousy communication skills,” he said. Immediately, I felt revulsion: No way was this Critic “my friend!” This voice that constantly undermined me right when I was trying to do something new? This voice that was always pointing out what could go wrong? Was he kidding?
“I see the Critic as being the part of us that is interested in survival at all costs,” Matthew explained. “For as loud as it can be, it’s actually incredibly insecure and afraid. It sees going after your dreams as a terrible threat, one that could come with rejection and feelings of failure. So, the Critic is going to do whatever it takes to avoid those experiences, even if that means speaking to you in ways that are abusive to stop you from taking a risk. It’s trying to keep you safe, but it has lousy communication skills. I’ve made a commitment to set boundaries with my Critic, rather than ignore it or attack back.”
Then, Matthew wanted to know: Had ignoring, placating, or fighting the Critic ever succeeded at making it go away? When I examined that question, I realized that no, it hadn’t. My Critic always came back, so the work of avoiding, pleasing, or attacking was endless (and exhausting). For the first time, with Matthew’s help, I began to listen to the specific things the Critic was telling me and tried to see the fear that was behind the Critic’s words.
For instance, the Critic had often said that my writing was shit and that I’d never get published. That voice was the fear of failure. When the Critic said this I avoided writing to not think about the possibility of failure. Or, I pushed myself relentlessly, buying into the illusion that an exhausting effort would guarantee the results I wanted. No pain, no gain, right? The Critic also told me that I was selfish and didn’t do enough for others. This represented my fear of not being likable enough unless I overcompensated and proved myself through doing acts of service. The Critic used judgment and condescension to make me afraid of not being liked, and in turn to push me to work harder by piling on the good deeds for other people. While wanting to be liked isn’t a bad thing, being driven by the Critic’s fear of rejection was an exhausting way to live. The Critic’s fear was in the driver’s seat, not my own desires to live from the value of courage.
After so many years of listening to my own Critic, and the Critics of so many clients and workshop attendees, talk a big game while being afraid and insecure at the core, I could see the same thing playing out in Taylor’s life. Her Critic was always looking out for her from a place of wanting to protect her from being rejected, and it used terrible communication as a misguided attempt at protection. If the Critic could berate her into not taking action, then maybe she wouldn’t take a risk that could involve failure—real or imagined. The Critic was trying, in its own dysfunctional way, to stop her from encountering pain.
Try this out for yourself. Revisit your answers to the “Investigating the Critic” exercise and look at the specific things that you wrote down, this time with an eye for seeing where the Critic is using bullying, intimidation, criticism, shaming, or something else to keep you from taking action toward your goals. What could its true agenda be in keeping you from taking risks? Does your Critic tell you that you’re not good enough? That other people will think your ideas are stupid? That so-and-so has already done what you want to do, and better, so there’s no point? Then ask yourself why the Critic might say those things, and how saying those things is your Critic behaving as your “best friend with lousy communication skills.”
If you believe what the Critic says and you back down from what you really want, then you never invite the risks that come with taking a chance on your biggest dreams. For your Critic, that short-term safety is worth it. Now you get to decide if it’s worth it to keep believing what the Critic tells you or if it’s time to change.
Change starts with having a different relationship with the Critic. It’s neither your enemy nor the person who should be giving you advice. Rather, it’s an insecure, fear-based aspect of ourselves that has one agenda: staying safe.
“To help myself not go into avoiding, pleasing, or attack, I try to think of my Critic as being like a small child,” I told Taylor. “It’s got limited skills for handling stress, and it tends to go for short-term thinking and immediate gratification. If I was encountering a small child throwing a temper tantrum, would it be effective to lock that child in a room to avoid him? If I please the child and give him whatever he wants, that might stop the tantrum, but there would always be more demands. The worst option, of course, is attack. If I attack a small child when he is throwing a tantrum, I end up doing more damage if he is screaming at me and I scream back. I become the abuser.”
“This makes me think of when my husband and I are in an argument,” Taylor said. “If we slam doors and avoid each other, it doesn’t help. If I say that I’m sorry when I’m really not feeling that way just to try to end the fight, that doesn’t help. And, I hate it when he does that with me. The worst is when I say something to him that I’ll regret.”
I was so glad that Taylor was making the connection between relating to her Critic and relating to other people in her life, especially because the notion of “kicking fear’s ass” is so rampant in our culture’s discussions of how to handle fear. Instead of seeing the Critic as something to be done away with, she was opening up to the idea that she could have the same investment in working things out with her Critic as she does with her husband.
What I knew from personal experience was that something even better was possible: The Critic’s angry, frightened behavior, when responded to with a mixture of compassion and boundaries, could heal. It’s the mixture of the two—compassion and boundaries—that is so radically transformative when working with the Critic.
The idea of seeing her Critic as a small child with limited skills had been helpful to Taylor in not going into avoidance, pleasing, or attack modes. She was stopping the habitual cycle of her fear routine.
“I feel like I’m starting to get all these different pieces and pulling them together,” Taylor told me. “I’m noticing what I need more, especially when the Pessimist routine is coming up, because I’m accessing the body. I’m hearing what my Critic has to say, which is still weird, but okay. I’m game. But, I keep wondering: If my Critic really is so afraid…what is the Critic so afraid of? I mean, I was never abused when I was growing up. I can’t think of any big trauma that I’ve survived. To be honest, I feel kind of bad when I consider the things that other people have gone through, and how charmed my life has been by comparison. I’m really lucky, and I have so much to be thankful for, so why am I so stuck like this?”
It was a question that I had contemplated many times myself, and I’d had more than one conversation that bordered on existential angst with friends about this. As humans are we just inherently fragile? Was this just the human condition? Was this the result of collective communities giving way to isolated societies? Was it something biochemical? Why was there this aspect of the self that seemed so fundamentally insecure? There was only one answer that seemed appropriate: the Critic was fundamentally afraid because life is fundamentally uncertain, and we live in a world that we can’t control.
So, that’s what I told her. “I think that the Critic clings to this illusion or idea that somehow you should be able to control your life better. You could control it through working harder, or you could control it through never making mistakes. You could control it by making endless plans. You could control it through being thinner, prettier, smarter, or richer.”
“It’s the shape-shifting!” Taylor said, as she put the pieces together. “Control is what’s behind the Critic’s shape-shifting. If I work more, I should have worked harder, and if I work so hard that I get sick, I should have known better to stop and take a break. It’s this thing where I’m always supposed to be in control somehow.”
“You’ve got it,” I said. “And, really, what’s happening is something that the Critic doesn’t want to face: Life itself is imperfect and bad things happen to good people. No one’s life ever looks as good as their Pinterest boards. No one ever achieves the lives they dream of without struggle. No one is in control! The Critic is terrified of this lack of control, so it’s striving and clinging for safety. In the name of safety, the Critic will do whatever it takes. It’ll tell you that there’s no point in trying and then berate you for not having tried harder. It’s illogical because it’s terrified.”
The idea made sense to Taylor, but it also brought up another unappealing possibility: Did this mean that she’d always need to put up with hearing the Critic’s anger and condescension, and there was nothing more to be done about it? I reminded her that listening without attachment meant listening without lending authority to the Critic’s voice. I told her that she could hear the words without necessarily believing them or doing what the Critic said. “But there is one other piece that’s helpful,” I added. “Once you know what the Critic says, it’s time for implementing some boundaries.”
Boundaries, with the Critic? At first, this idea usually feels impossible. Clients are often skeptical when I tell them that there is a process they can use to help transform even the angriest, meanest, most judgmental critical voices. Since this work is never about becoming “fearless” and since we know that avoiding, pleasing, and attacking don’t work, the strategies that I’ll share aren’t about different ways to ignore the voices or telling them to go away. Instead, we start changing your relationship to your Critic. After learning to listen to its voice without getting hooked by what it says, you throw down some very real, no-nonsense boundaries.
We’ve arrived at the most effective tool for working with Critic voices that I’ve ever come across. This is a tool that my coach Matthew originally taught me, and I’ve now passed it on to hundreds of people in one-on-one coaching sessions, workshops, and large-scale telesummits and online classes. It’s called, “Re-do, Please.”
I’ve found that it’s easiest to understand how you use “Re-do, Please” with your Critic if you first imagine how you’d use it with another person. My husband and I have certainly had practice with this tool! Between two people, “Re-do, Please” would work like this: whenever either you or your partner says something that feels tense, disrespectful, or unloving to the other, you commit to asking for a “Re-do, Please.”
For example, let’s say that my husband forgets something at the store that I needed for dinner. He gets home and I’m frustrated. Without thinking, I say, “Seriously? You forgot that, again? I’m so sick of you forgetting to swing by the store when I ask you to.”
Then, my husband says (usually after taking a breath and accessing the body): “Uh, re-do, please.” That’s his signal to me that I’ve said something that isn’t feeling respectful, and he’d like me to rephrase it.
After taking a breath, accessing the body, and noticing what I’m feeling, I say, “Okay, okay. I’m sorry. I’m feeling overwhelmed and upset because we’re out of this ingredient. I really need it for dinner tonight. Can you go to the store?”
The tone of “Re-do, Please” is the most important part of its efficacy as a tool. The delivery is matter-of-fact, rather than passive-aggressively conveying through tone that deep down you’re still pissed. You would practice the tool of “Re-do, Please” in the same way with your Critic. When it says something negative to you, you can kindly say to the Critic, “Re-do, please. I’m open to hearing what you have to say, but it needs to be phrased respectfully.”
When Taylor first began practicing this with the things her Critic said, it sounded something like this:
Critic: How is a client ever going to hire you if you sound like an idiot?
Taylor: (After taking a breath and accessing the body) Re-do, please. I’m open to hearing what you’re saying, but I need you to respectfully rephrase that.
Taylor’s Critic didn’t automatically become chipper and positive when she asked the Critic to communicate respectfully. It said things like: “That’s bullshit. I’m not a liar. No client will hire you if you sound like an idiot, and that’s just the truth.” If the Critic’s tone or words were not respectful, Taylor would respond with: “Re-do, please. I’m open to hearing this, but it must be respectful. Re-do, please.”
Taylor’s Critic didn’t give up right away. It responded with softening its words, but still sounding unsupportive: “Whatever. It’s just not a smart move to quit your day job when you’re that nervous on the phone. That’s a basic part of this whole freelance thing, and you can’t handle it.” Whenever Taylor’s Critic shifted slightly but remained critical, Taylor would speak to that: “I see how you shifted the words, yet this still isn’t supportive. I need us to speak to each other in a way that is supportive and respectful. Perhaps you might tell me what you’re most afraid of? Re-do, please.”
It was at that point that Taylor’s Critic arrived at the real fear: “I’m terrified that if you fail at this business, you won’t have money to pay the bills. I’m terrified that your husband will resent you for sinking your money into this. I’m terrified that if we fail at this, it’ll mean that you’ll work at a job you hate for the rest of your life, and that’s just that.”
As soon as your Critic, like Taylor’s, starts to communicate what it is afraid of and drops the judgment that was covering over that fear, you and your Critic are ready to work with what’s at the core. When the Critic drops its defensiveness, you’re speaking with the wound in need of healing, rather than the armor that keeps the old routine in place.
“What are you really, truly afraid of?” That’s the question that you want to ask your Critic once the defensiveness has dropped. If the Critic will tell you what it’s afraid of, then you can start to build resilience in that area. When Taylor’s Critic was spinning in its own fears about money, being resented by her husband, or failing at doing what she loved, it was only churning the fears over and over again. That kept her feeling stuck. Through dialoguing with the Critic and using “Re-do, Please,” Taylor could hear what her Critic was afraid of, and regard her Critic with tenderness and care, rather than attacking, pleasing, or avoiding. She could see how her wounded Critic was like a small child in need of healing, rather than an enemy that she needed to conquer.
Using “Re-Do, Please”
Try the “Re-do, Please” process for yourself. Start by revisiting your answers to the “Investigating the Critic” exercise from earlier in this chapter. Take each statement from that exercise one at a time, and try saying it out loud and listen for what your Critic says. Each time the Critic says something that doesn’t feel respectful or supportive, respond with the statement “Re-do, please” to gently share with your Critic what you need. For example, if the Critic’s tone is harsh, say, “Re-do, please. I want to hear what you’re trying to say, but I need to hear a kinder, more neutral tone.” Repeat “Re-do, Please” with every harsh response your Critic comes up with until you get down to the fear that’s at the core of that Critic statement. (This exercise is also available as a worksheet and guided meditation, at http://www.yourcourageouslife.com/courage-habit.) You can also have a powerful experience with this exercise if you record it or speak out loud while looking into a mirror.
The process will follow a back-and-forth, in which you write down what the Critic says, and then keep responding to what it says with “Re-do, please. I want to hear what you have to say, and I’m committed to respectful communication. Please rephrase that. Re-do, please.”
As you continue to respond, you’re looking for the moment when the Critic is willing to get real about what it fears and step into some vulnerability. Until then, every time the Critic offers some statement that isn’t supportive either in words or tone, say “Re-do, please,” and add something that establishes boundaries with the Critic. Give it kind directions for exactly what needs to change in order for it to hopefully rephrase its message. If the Critic uses calm, reasonable logic but with an undertone that isn’t supportive, ask the Critic to rephrase using a statement that is supportive.
This exercise is a powerful practice for creating respectful communication from your Critic. You are drawing a boundary line: The Critic will be listened to, you will no longer go into attack mode, and the Critic cannot attack either. You won’t allow it to be disrespectful.
Expect this process to be one that you repeat regularly and return to any time things are challenging. You don’t “get rid of” your Critic. You just keep uncovering more and more layers of what it is afraid of and processing those layers. Through processing each of the Critic’s fears, you find freedom from the fear.
“Let’s go back to that image of a small child,” I suggested to Taylor when we arrived at her Critic’s deepest fears—not having enough money, being resented, or working a job she disliked for the rest of her life. “If you were sitting next to a small child, and she said she was afraid of not having enough money, what would you do?”
Taylor started to get emotional as she took a breath and shared what came next. I could imagine her brown eyes filling with tears, as she told me about just how tight money had been for her family when she was a kid. Her parents had both hated their jobs, and it wore on them and caused them to take out their frustration in the form of fighting with each other in front of Taylor, or being irritable and impatient with Taylor any time she needed lunch money for school or new school supplies. When Taylor was ten years old, a big rift occurred. Taylor’s father had loaned money to Taylor’s uncle without telling Taylor’s mother first. Her uncle never paid the money back and her mother never forgave her father.
“That sounds like it was enormously difficult to watch, especially as a child,” I said. We were both quiet for a moment. Then I asked, “If you were with that ten-year-old you right now, what kind of support would you give her? Even if you couldn’t control life and make money appear or stop the fighting, but you were there to support that ten-year-old you, what would you do?”
“I’d let her know that we turned out okay,” Taylor said, without hesitation. “Even without the money, we turned out okay.”
That session with Taylor was an incredibly intense, emotional session in which I myself felt tears coming to my eyes as she made connections between her present-day circumstances and the Critic that was trying desperately not to experience financial hardships or someone else’s resentment. It was one of those sessions where tough memories were recounted, but a powerful thread was emerging. Taylor confirmed for me that even though there had been a lack of money and plenty of fear growing up, nothing she deeply feared had truly come to fruition.
The Critic that screamed or nagged in her head in its search for safety had distracted Taylor from the most important facts of her life’s story. She had developed resilience through hardship, and that resilience mattered more than the fact that she’d endured hardship. Even though she was imperfect and had found herself going into Pessimist mode on more than one occasion, she had been committed enough to her dreams and living from the place of her most courageous self to decide to seek help working with fear and self-doubt as it arose.
One last time, I’d like to ask that you turn back to the “Investigating the Critic” exercise, and review what it is that your Critic says to you. At this point, you might notice that some of what the Critic says fails to have as much impact because you’ve read the words so many times that you now see where it’s just afraid and says things that are untrue.
However, this time look for the things that the Critic says that you know would still hook you. Examine anything that the Critic might say that would be difficult to be with and try to clearly understand the Critic’s agenda, or its reason for trying to keep you from taking a step forward. Pay attention to how the Critic’s reasoning is rooted in a dysfunctional need for safety. Use the tool of “Re-do, Please” with those statements until you get to the bottom of what the Critic is afraid of. Or, try asking the Critic: “What are you really afraid of? What’s really going on here?”
In the weeks that followed, there was a powerful fierceness that was starting to arise in Taylor and show up in every area of her life. Taylor’s Primary Focus had been to grow her photography business to support her, and now she was applying the Courage Habit step of listening without attachment any time the Critic showed up around that goal.
During our calls, she was fully claiming the fact that she had legitimate desires for her life, and what’s more, she was worthy of them. Even when she had days where she felt resistant, she was keeping more perspective than before. Accessing the body had given her the ability to feel resistance or frustration, and then process it by taking walks or stopping to breathe. Listening to the Critic without getting hooked by what it said, and using tools like “Re-do, Please” to set boundaries and get to the root of the Critic’s fear had put Taylor in charge of her life.
The quality of our sessions had changed, and now we were moving at a fast clip. Instead of hearing about all the reasons why something “would never work,” now I was hearing about all the options that might be possible. She also started to see more regular requests for portrait sessions coming through, and she and her husband had sat down to map out a financial plan for themselves without fighting.
“Admittedly, a glass of wine while we ran the numbers probably helped,” Taylor said, laughing. I was so happy to hear the lightness in her voice, and I knew that she was proud of herself, too. Taylor had learned the most fundamental lesson in allowing her most courageous self to come forward: The Critic is part of who we are, a piece of the whole. If you want to love and accept who you are fully, then that will include learning how to love and accept the pieces that are messier or harder to be with, such as the Critic. We often fear that if we give the Critic our attention, it will just grow bigger and louder. Instead, Taylor found that the power of love and compassion for healing the Critic’s wounding was the real key to her freedom.
This chapter has covered a lot of essential ground. I’m always encouraging clients to remember to keep leaning on that first tool of accessing the body, in whatever way they can, so that they can stay present to the process that they’re in. I encourage the same for you. What body-based practice can you do for even five minutes after reading this chapter?
It’s also important that as we work through each part of the Courage Habit, you keep circling back to your Primary Focus. Remind yourself of what your Primary Focus goals are, and be very clear about the exact words your Critic uses to convince you that those dreams either aren’t worth pursuing, or that you aren’t capable of creating the life that you want. After Taylor uncovered some of her Critic’s deepest fears, she had more awareness of what her Critic was most likely to say when she was taking steps toward her Primary Focus. She returned to using the “Re-do, Please” tool every time the Critic showed up. Having a specific check-in around just her Primary Focus goals helped her to feel more focused with the changes that she was making.
We’re now halfway through the four parts of the Courage Habit. All the pieces work in tandem, but once you know how to access the body and listen without attachment, you’re ready for step three: reframing limiting Stories. By the time a fear pattern is in place, we’ve all spent far too long believing in limited, narrow views of what’s possible for our lives. Reframing limiting Stories is where we go once we know what the Critic is saying and we’re ready to give it a new Story to follow.