It's not you
Where the Inner Critic really comes from - and how we can move beyond it
The Inner Critic, thankfully (she says, breathing a big sigh of relief), isn’t really something that bothers me any more.
I understand how privileged I am to be able to say that. And I’m grateful every day that I was fortunate enough to accidentally stumble across the path that led me to releasing and healing those wounds.
Yes, it was very much accidental - because I was the LAST person who would actively seek therapy or support. In classic ‘driven person burying my head in the sand so I don’t have to feel’ mentality, I was too hell bent on proving I was perfect, coping and ‘FINE’, thank you very much, to even consider I might not be.
I know for many people, dealing with their inner critic is a huge work in progress.
For some, it lasts a lifetime. Others never even begin the work - spiralling deeper and deeper into self-destructive thoughts and behaviours driven by the idea there’s something fundamentally wrong with them.
I know some of those people. And every time I hear how they feel about themselves and the world around them, my inner desire to make things ok for everyone has to wrestle with the knowledge that the only person who can undertake that journey for them is them… it’s not within my power to change those who aren’t seeking change themselves (otherwise known as the eternal curse of the empathic therapist!).
I’m so lucky to be at this end of the journey.
Along with that has come a lot of soul-searching and reflecting, to work out where that inner critic came from. How it was pieced together, bit by bit, until it became something all-encompassing enough to destroy my confidence and lead me to places in life I really didn’t want to be.
Harmful, abusive and unhealthy relationships. A business that demanded more of me than I felt able to give. Emotional exhaustion. Feeling like I had no voice or power in my life. People pleasing until it nearly broke me.
And I’ve realised…
My inner critic wasn't me.
Just as yours isn’t you. Not the real you, anyway.
The truth is, the inner critic doesn’t come from us at all.
It’s not something we’re born with… although we can very quickly learn it if we have an overly critical, or self-critical parent or caregiver (the two very often go hand in hand).
It’s what we learn through experience - and through not knowing how to process those experiences without making them mean something about us.
That IS something we’re born with - that search for meaning, rationale, reason - that tendency to look for cause and effect in our circumstances, and join the dots (albeit so very often the wrong dots). And if we don’t immediately understand what the reason is - say, somebody projecting their own self-judgement, anger or sadness in our direction to help them feel better - then, well, we tend to assume it must be about us.
So for me, that inner critical voice was the school bullies - who I now know were protecting their tribe by singling me out as ‘different’. Who maybe struggled with my good girl behaviour and ‘other’ness, thanks to my ‘posh’ East-Anglian accent in a sea of Cheshire mingled with Merseyside; and so found any reason they could to criticise and control their territory.
It was the well-intentioned but thoughtless relatives, who undoubtedly wanted the best for me - but maybe thought that picking fault with my appearance would lead me to happiness and luck in the love stakes (because pretty princesses win at life, right? I think we all know that one’s a myth, now, but it’s sadly still pretty culturally ingrained).
It was the girls in my First Aid organisation who laughed at my hair, called me Florence Nightingale and made me dance to ‘Like a Virgin’ in front of our whole summer camp, aged 10.
It was the GP who poked, prodded and labelled me as having 'a bit of a tummy' without a second thought for the fact I had ears.
It was the P.E. teacher who wrote me off as incapable because I couldn’t run fast, like the other kids.
Later on, it was the friends who left me out of their fun - probably not for any reason other than they gelled better (or maybe I didn’t love the right boyband…).
It was the boyfriends who didn't immediately answer my calls or want to be with me every second of the day.
The deeply troubled but ‘oh so chummy’ housemate who told me I was too messy, a bad friend for not staying in with her instead of going to gigs, that I must be unhappy to want to be out all the time - and who loved to make me feel inferior and trip me up by dragging me into intellectual conversations I didn’t fully understand, challenging me for an opinion and then explaining exactly why I was wrong.
It was all of these things… thanks to my faulty interpretation of them as being about ME.
Sometimes I'd hear these people’s voices in my mind, or hear myself repeating things they'd said.
Sometimes, it was spirals of self-abusive thought and emotional meltdowns where it all got too much - where I'd feel like an awful failure who would never be good enough.
Often, it was just a feeling of not belonging, not quite measuring up... and being constantly on edge, with a background hum of 'Where am I going to put my foot in it, what’s going to happen next?’ - to the extent I would struggle to even look people in the eye on the bus, or have a conversation at the supermarket checkout.
And it was a whole LOT of 'I must keep trying, to prove and better myself'.
So much of that.
And that’s what the Inner Critic is, for me.
It isn't this clear, resonant voice we all imagine that constantly crows "You're not enough! Hey yoo-hoo, unworthy one - you don't deserve success!".
It's often not easy to distinguish at all - because it’s all of the above and more. It becomes part of the way we show up in the world. Part of who we believe we fundamentally are. Part of our identity - a false identity that sneaks in, uninvited, and makes itself at home.
And it's the loneliest place to be - because listening to that inner critic instead of the real, true you, makes you push away love, friendship, possibility, joy - and so much more.
I was lucky to always HAVE love and support (even if I didn’t always recognise it at the time!) - and I’m so very grateful for that. But it took me a long time to give that love and support to myself, instead of believing all those external frames of reference meant more.
Looking back now, in some ways, I’d say having had such a tussle with my inner critic was a great gift for me - because what it HAS given me is huge empathy, compassion for people and their feelings wherever they're at, and a deep desire to help others out of that deep, dark hole.
It's why I do what I do now - nothing gives me more joy - and I’m thankful that I’m now able to use that gift from a place where I can say I am enough.
More than enough.
I'm bloody good - and I'm here to own it.
Want to join me in feeling more than enough?
I'm running a masterclass called How to Overcome the Inner Critic this November (and it’ll be available as a recording after it goes out).
I’d love to see you there 💛