I have a voice inside my head that has a dedicated job to cause me to question everything. It doesn’t matter what’s going on in my life at that moment. This voice will tell me something that will make it worse.
I call this voice my Inner Critic. It is my constant companion, no matter what I am doing.
When I am writing, it reminds me that my writing is not good. When I am reading it questions if this is the best book I could be reading. And when I just want to relax and maybe watch something fun, it tells me how I am wasting my time and in-turn my life.
There is nothing I can do to please my Inner Critic.
Don’t get me wrong, sometimes this Inner Critic helps me too. It helps me in checking and re-checking my work, making sure I am not making any glaring mistakes. It keeps me from making any impulsive decisions. At times it does push me to improve myself.
But most of the time, my Inner Critic is just an annoying voice I have to ignore if I want any peace and calm in my life. Trust me, it’s not that easy.
I am pretty sure I am not alone in being stuck with an Inner Critic. I think most of us have this voice in our minds causing chaos and self-doubt.
I came across an interesting way to lessen the impact of our beloved Inner Critic. It asks us to give a name to our Inner Critic. The problem is not that we have an Inner Critic. The problem is that we start to believe that whatever the Inner Critic is saying is what I am saying about myself, so that must be true.
However, if we give a name to our Inner Critic, then we are telling ourselves that this is the opinion of a separate entity and not what I believe.
I am not entirely sure how effective is this method to keep our Inner Critic at bay. But I did have a lot of fun naming my Inner Critic.
There is a Hindi movie called Kahaani. There is a character in it named Bob Biswas, who is basically an assassin. He is a simple-looking fellow who hides in plain sight. He appears completely harmless. He even approaches his targets with a lovely smile on his face and greets them sweetly before taking out his gun and shooting them.
For some weird reason, I picture my Inner Critic like him. My Inner Critic is also harmless looking and appears very friendly. But when he gets close, he gets deadly.
Do let me know if you are also letting an Inner Critic live in your mind rent-free and what name would you give them.