Judgments & the Inner Critic

There are differences in our internal judgements and the reality of how we are. We truly can be our worst critic, but not only that, our expectations of how we respond to the world can be so skewed by this internal critic that we react out of this perspective rather than our heart. This is something I deeply struggle with. Many instances in my life have been dictated by the inner critic over my own heart's choice. The amount of times I have not tried something out of the belief I would be incapable of success is countless. The times I have cried myself to sleep convinced that those closest to me see nothing but how I see myself, through the lens of my flaws. Flaws that the inner critic takes as the truth of who I am. Flaws that are in the way I carry myself, how I interact with strangers, my word choices, how I look in the mirror, the entire perception of who I am as a person. My inner critic is mean. That small voice acts like they're attempting to protect me from rejection, disappointment, pain, failure, you name it but in reality is invoking that same fate unnecessarily before I even have the opportunity to face those things. This inner critic constantly tells me I'm not good enough for what exists in my life. It tells me I'm not good enough to care for my pets, to hold the job I do, to order coffee properly, to write this blog, to have people love me. It speaks in an aggressive tone that is always rushed and matter-of-fact. Nothing I do is ever enough for the inner critic and I spent a good majority of my life attempting to solve this. This led me into a deeper sense of insecurity and living my life from a place of fear. It's still something I struggle with it, but in the process, I have learned of a separate part of my being I can listen to, my heart.

The heart is kind and warm. The heart never punishes me for failures but instead allows learning from these missteps. The heart is soft, gentle and something that speaks to you from the depth of your being. It's the smaller voice congratulating you for having the courage to begin, the action of smiling in utter joy from witnessing life, the tears cried during loss, the words spoken in complete clarity without thoughts hindering them. Your heart is the purest form of who you are and is something we typically must relearn and return to because the inner critic has overshadowed it.

We discover our heart throughout the process of creating space for ourselves (see first post about space). Creating space provides you with self-awareness, which when expanded allows you presence within yourself. With this you can recognize the difference between what is you and what’s outside of you. What is you relates to the heart and what’s outside of you are judgements passed on through others that became your inner critic. This inner critic is what I consider outside of you because its origination came from external sources. As we grow and allow ourselves the space to learn these differences, our perspective shifts closer to those that are our looking glasses. The ones who see us, all of us, as we are and reflect that back to us. They're capable of seeing your flaws and accepting them; witnessing these judgements and contradicting them in word and action. These are the connections we’re meant to make in this world. 

A huge disconnect can exist in how we view the world and ourselves compared to how those around us see us. An example of this happened to me recently when I officiated a friend’s wedding. Public speaking is not something I historically do. I’ve read poetry at open mic nights a handful of times but nothing like speaking in front of 65 people at an important event.

During the ceremony, majority of my energy was spent holding back a riot of tears, but I was still very aware of where I messed up in my speech. The momentary hesitations, slight forgotten or misplaced words, pieces I left out I really wanted to say, all of the things my inner critic immediately latched on to instead of recognizing “hey you just married two of your best friends in a beautiful ceremony and did a scary thing and that’s awesome!” No, sadly it was fear and shame that took over. From my perspective, I’d messed up. Here is where it is important that we have people to reflect to us what we need to see. The bride and groom were elated at my performance. I had so many people coming up and telling me how moved they were by the speech, commenting on the fluidity of my words and the heart that shone through. Not a single person mentioned any of what I saw as mess ups, in fact they came to tell me the exact opposite. Where I messed up, people saw heart. My idea of how the speech went was entirely misperceived by my inner critic, and I immediately assumed the same judgment was passed on to me from the bride and groom. All I saw were my mistakes and not the whole of the speech and it skewed the perception I had of what I'd done. 

We can dream up entire scenarios in our heads about events and not even a third of it can be true. Sure, I had mistakes in my speech compared to when I practiced, but the mistakes did not define the performance. They were small in proportion to the event and that is what my mind was forgetting. My mind was disproportioning the mistakes to the whole of the event. Our minds do this more often than we catch on. We can walk into a room and automatically assume looks are being cast with unease towards our appearance when in reality people are just looking at who walked in. We can say something in a crowd and nobody immediately responds to which we assume our words don’t matter, but maybe we just weren’t fully heard. The assumptions we make off our internal biases can be hurtful to those around us as well as ourselves. 

Let’s imagine a scenario that you believe you are not good enough to receive the attention you are receiving from another person. You really like said person but can’t muster up the belief that you are worthy of their time and energy they spend towards you. With this belief, you begin to distance yourself from the other and act less engaged when you two are out in public. You witness them talking to other people and jealousy creeps in. You desire their attention for yourself but don’t believe you can receive it. This belief exhibits itself by the distant behavior and the jealousy of watching others receive what you desire. When you see them giving attention to other people you view this as taking away from the attention you yourself could receive. Unbeknownst to you, you are receiving that attention, if not more, by this person you are interested in but your self-belief makes it hard for you to see it. When believing you are unworthy of another’s attention you build a wall up between you and the other person. The inner critic believes you can’t receive the attention, unintentionally rejecting the attention when it’s given, and once they seek out attention elsewhere, jealousy comes into play as a protective emotion that is secondary to feeling unworthy.

This creates an almost self-fulfilling prophecy that the mind uses to reaffirm the negative narrative. This is an instance where we get a choice in our thought patterns. Do we continue to believe this negative narrative spun by the inner critic, or do we choose to allow a new narrative to form by rejecting what the inner critic says and opening ourselves up to those around us? 

When we connect to those around us we open ourselves up to new perspectives of who we are. 

Plus, the judgements we hold against ourselves we usually pass through to others, a favorite of mine’s lyrics, “we’re all looking for our own flaws in others”, sums it up quite well. Thank you Julian Casablancas. There’s a tendency to pass judgment of ourselves onto others by way of viewing them through our inner critic’s perception; we judge others the same way we judge ourselves and it’s based on our internal judgments of self. This is also a two-way street. Others may harbor misplaced judgments against us and it's important to remember where this stems. Connecting with others brings in a new experience that can counteract the judgment of both others and ourselves.

There lies a responsibility in who holds the judgments made. We take responsibility of judgments when we pause to evaluate the judgment itself and determine if it belongs. Most often, it is ours to take. This is because majority of judgments made come from inner critics, but also even when another's judgment of you is made, taking the responsibility allows you to pass that judgment off as one that does not fit, releasing it. It is a way to reclaim your authority of your person. By taking that responsibility within us, we can more easily produce a freedom of our own perception by challenging the existing judgments left from past experiences and reinforced by our inner critic. 

More to come soon.

- Jen