Ep 147: Unleashing Creativity and Passion by Befriending Your Inner Critic

It's about having the clarity , self-confidence and unstoppable belief to go after and get everything you want . If you'll come with me , I'll show you how Well . Hello , friends . I hope you had an amazing week .

For those of you who've listened to the podcast before , you already know this , but for those who are new , I wanted to kind of give you a little bit of a picture of what I help people with before we dive into today's episode .

I've got a lot of new listeners and I just kind of wanted to talk for a minute about the types of things that I help people with and why , in the hopes that this will , I hope , resonate for you . But it certainly does help to set up what we're going to talk about in this podcast episode .

So I help people with career and life at midlife and I am at midlife and so I know this very well and I help people with two things primarily . I either help people who are on the corporate track or who own their own business , and I help them refire that's what I call it . So reignite .

Maybe they feel like they've been coasting , maybe they feel like they've just plateaued and they're sitting here at midlife and it's really easy if you find yourself there at midlife to kind of say you know what . It's too late , it's too late . I took my eye off the ball , I've gotten comfortable .

It's too late to really do what I thought I wanted to do with my life . I help people like that discover that it isn't too late . But actually midlife is the perfect time to refire into your next level self . That's why my membership , my monthly membership , is called next level . That is what it's all about .

It's about taking everything that you have and really making it better , making it into a more fulfilling next level , more prosperous , whatever it is for you , whatever it is that you want version of what you already have . So that's one area that I help people with .

And the other area that I help with is people who are looking to completely reinvent , so people who might be on top of their game in their corporate life . Many executives that I work with are in the upper ranks VP , svp , c-level executives and some management level executives who are looking to say you know what I'm done with this ladder ?

I've climbed to the top rung or as far up that ladder as I care to go . I'm looking to do something completely different . And for each of those clients that answer looks different For some , for many , it's about I want to take everything I know and I want to parlay it into a business of my own .

I want to call my own shots , I want to give back in some way , I want to make a contribution that's mine in a business that's mine . And for some people it's about something completely different .

You know , maybe they just want to get off the work track entirely and they're looking to say what does the rest of it look like if I never work again , you know ? And so I help people with those two things refire and reinvention at midlife .

And because of that , a lot of what I work with them on is you know , I would say it's probably at least 60 to 80% deep mindset work . Why ? Because there's a reason why most people never do those two things . Most people coast through their life , get to a level of success that they're happy with .

Maybe they have an okay family life and an okay relationship and an okay work life and they're making a decent living and they have a decent car and they have a decent house and maybe even better than decent right but they're just not happy . But they just stay where they are because they're comfortable .

Why does they do that when inside there probably is something that's saying you could be more , you could do more . You could take this okay marriage and make it amazing . You could take this 25 pound overweight body and make it what it used to be . You know you could take this director level job and you could turn it into an SVP if you wanted to .

But what does that require ? What do those things require ? Right , they require you to get uncomfortable . They require you to make a courageous decision . They require you to do something different .

They require you to wake up really in the middle of your life and say I might be fine where I am , but I'm not willing to settle for fine for the rest of my life , right ? And when you decide that , you end up usually encountering all kinds of mind drama .

And it looks a little different for all of us , because the seeds of our mind drama date all the way back , the origins of it , to our family of origin , to us as our beginning selves when we're little , right , and the experiences we had , the things that people said to us , even the people around us that we saw , and how we interpreted those people , and the

way we looked up to those people and who they were in their life , and in some way , we're all either replicating that or we're trying to escape that right , and by the time we get to midlife , I believe that it's time to stop trying to replicate or escape the things that we saw early on , and it's time to say , hey , this is where I am and this is who I

am and this is what I want . And now , because of all of that , this is how I'm going to , this is where I'm going now , this is what I decide to do , and then figuring out how to get there . That's what I help people with .

In order to get to that place , though , to get from thinking about wanting more to actually pursuing the more that you want you have to overcome a lot of mindset drama , and I've talked about lots of different versions of this on the podcast , and if you've listened to any of my older episodes , you know that I had a couple in there on the inner critic .

You'll know that I am not a big fan of trying to silence your inner critic . I don't think we can resist it because it's in there , it is hardwired in to our brain and it's there for a reason , right , it's there . It's not trying to derail you , it's trying to protect you . It's not trying to harm you or ruin your life or to keep you from your dreams .

Well , it is trying to keep you from your dreams , but it's trying to do it because it's trying to keep you safe .

It's a combination of all of the early childhood experiences you had in your family of origin and in your early schooling years and your early life , coupled with really what the human brain is in its oldest origins , which you know , the reptilian part of our brain or the primitive part of our brain has been around since the dawn of man and it's really trying to

protect you . So the inner critic gets formed as a means of really keeping us safe from the things that we interpret as dangerous

. You know , and there's nothing more dangerous than your brain will tell you at midlife than trying to take a very successful corporate career and blow it up or walk away from it in favor of something entirely new that we're not really sure we can do in starting our own business .

And you know , that seems kind of dangerous , especially if you're trying to do both . If you're trying to stay on top of your corporate game and get a business going which is what I'm doing I think that feels more dangerous or like a bad idea than that . You know , but if it's something that's calling to you , there's so much upside that comes from it .

It's so great to do that dual thing , that it's so great , honestly , that I'm prolonging , that I don't want to pivot out of my corporate life for a while . I really love what I do and I love the industry that I'm in now and it's so fulfilling .

It's like the manifestation of everything that I ever wished or dreamed it could be when I was just starting out that I want to prolong this . I'm loving it and I want to stay in that love for a while .

But at the same time , you know , I always knew at the beginning that by the time I got to midlife I would probably want to give back in some way and I originally thought that I would want to do it as an adjunct professor .

You know , teaching brand or brand marketing or something to students right , and giving them that love and that view into what that career track could be for them . I thought , I really thought that's what I would do and , as it happens , it's not .

What I'm doing is helping people do I feel like what I've always done , which is I have spent my entire career refiring and optimizing where I am , and now I'm starting the reinvention . So the things that I'm teaching are the things that I've spent my last 30 years doing , you know , and now that I'm at midlife , I'm loving that .

Just for a while I get to do both , and someday soon probably someday I will pick a point at which I decide to go all in on the entrepreneurial thing , but not for a while . I'm really loving what I'm doing and I love that I get to help other people do the same thing in whatever way that that shows up for them .

But that leads me to what I want to talk about on this podcast and I've talked about it before about the inner critic , and it's something that I understand , why a lot of coaches and teachers and even psychologists will say you need to silence the inner critic if you ever want to refire or reinvent , because if you don't , it's going to stand in your way .

I don't believe that that's true and I don't even believe it's a good idea .

I do help my clients in other ways , because we do tons of deep thought work and so I do help them find new thoughts , and because you're going to have to you know , when you feel , when you hear that voice of your inner critic flare up you're going to have to , at certain points , find a way to move beyond it , and the way you move beyond it is by

finding a new thought . When a thought of fear or panic or whatever arises in you , or self-doubt , it is important to be aware of that and to find a new thought . That's one of the things that I work with them on .

But way before we get to that a thought pivot , we have to spend some time really developing compassion and understanding and , I think , gratitude for the voice of our inner critic . That might sound weird , but it's really , really important . You do not want to be at war with a part of yourself , and the inner critic is part of yourself .

So I just want to have you sit with that idea for a minute as we get this episode

. I want you to think about how active your own inner critic is . How often do you hear the voice of self-doubt in your head ? Maybe you're someone who struggles with imposter syndrome . Who am I to think I can do XYZ or whatever ? Maybe you're someone who spends a ton of time worrying about the judgments of others or the criticisms of others .

Maybe you're someone who has an inner perfectionist and feels like if you can't do it perfect , you're going to be a huge failure . Or maybe you're someone who's tried and maybe failed at things in the past and so you're worried that you're going to fail again . There are so many different ways that our inner critic can show up . Some of us have multiple ways .

For some of us it just flares up in one way at different points in time . It's different for all of us , but I want you to think about in your life how does yours show up ? When did you try something bigger , decide you wanted to go , do something big , and what were those feelings of angst that came up ? What was it ? Was it fear ? Was it panic ?

Was it self-doubt ? Was it resignation , right ? What was it that came up for you when you first started to think about making a big change in some way in your life . I want you to think about that for a minute , because I'm going to give you today some exercises on befriending your inner critic . You really do need to be an empathetic friend .

Think about the inner critic that you have as an alternate ego . It's a version of you . It's just a really scared , panicked , fearful , doubt-ridden version of you , and think about with empathy . If you look at that inner part of yourself as a friend , look at it as one of your friends . It's a version of you .

Imagine that it sits outside of you and that you're you know , sounds very woo-woo , but it's really important .

Imagine it's sitting at the table with you or you're having a cocktail or a coffee , whatever , and you're conversing with it and your inner critic , that version of you , is just spewing all of the things that it says to you all of the time , you know . Imagine how that person feels . Imagine like look at them with empathy . Imagine their persona .

What do they look like ? Imagine the expression on their face . Imagine the emotions that that friend would be feeling if they were constantly expressing all of that . Think about that for a minute . That's not great , you know . So , in that way , if you're thinking about that as a version , one of the versions of you .

It's not the powerful version of you , the empowered one that's brave and courageous and makes bold decisions and does big things , steps into the spotlight , but it's the version of you that is really like , almost like a fearful mother . It's trying to protect you . It wants to keep you under its wing of protection .

It wants to keep you safe , it wants to keep you alive , it wants to keep you out of danger . It doesn't want you to do anything scary or big , not because it wants to keep you from being happy , but it wants to keep you from doing something that might lead to your demise , right .

So I want you to think about through this exercise that I'm going to take you through .

I'm going to give you a series of questions , and I hope this is something that , after this episode is over that you'll go , just write these questions down and spend a little quiet time , you know , getting to know your inner critic and thinking of it as a friend , as an alternate version of you and a you that you don't despise and you don't try to run from

and you don't silence and you don't try to cut off , but a version of you that you develop compassion for and that you grow to have a love for . You don't have to listen to it , you know , but you can appreciate that really , all it's trying to do is to keep you safe and that it wants the best for you .

And I think that is how you make peace with your inner critic . You don't silence it , you don't ignore it , you don't cut it off . What you do when you see it in the way that I'm going to show you how to do and befriend it , is you quiet it , you give it peace because it's been heard and it's been acknowledged and you don't have to listen to it .

That's kind of where I help my clients get to is let's first understand it , let's first befriend it and then , once we really have a good sense of who it is sometimes I even have my people name it let's give it a name and that way , when it flares up , you can say , yeah , I see you , I hear you , but we're going to do this anyway and it's okay .

In that way you're overriding the voice and the intent of your inner critic , but you're doing it in a way that allows it to be seen and so you're not at war inside of yourself . You're not coming at that desire to kind of push beyond it from a place of resistance , or there's no icky emotions associated with it .

You're doing it from a place of compassion and respect and even , I think , gratitude . Again , if you look at it as a protective mother . However , you want to look at it a best friend who's just trying to take your arm and pull you back from the edge , try to keep you safe from danger . That's what your inner critic is .

So what I want you to do is I want you to take out a piece of paper because I'm going to give you a series of questions and I want you to answer these questions for yourself .

First of all , at the top of the paper , I just want you to write my inner critic and then , in the line below that , I want you to say its name is and you can name it later if you want to .

You don't have to , but I think it's kind of fun because you got to know this is an inner narrative that for the rest of your life , if you continue to kind of have dreams that are pushing you forward , your inner critic will be there and it doesn't matter how much thought work you do or how much self-confidence you build up or how successful you are .

If you have an inner critic that's active to some extent , it will probably be active for the rest of your life . So it makes a lot more sense to be friended , to give it a persona and to get to know it and where it's coming from and what makes it tick and all of that stuff , so that you can see it and you can appreciate it .

But you can just say you know , I hear you , but that's what I say to mine . We're going to do it anyway . It's okay and just kind of quiet down . And I envisioned it always like sitting there and thinking , okay , you know . And so it's sitting there saying , well , I told you , you know , and it's sitting there and it's watching .

But I'm able to silence it and not give it any weight . It doesn't really keep me from doing the things that I want to go do , but it's always there , I can sense its presence . So it's good to just make friends

with it . So you know , you can write down its name and think of that later if you want . But I want you to ask yourself a series of questions . I want you to ask yourself first . To do this , you're going to have to think about , you know , sometimes instances where it's reared its head .

I want you to say what are the things that it says to me , right ? And I want you to just write those down . Think of the thoughts of self-doubt , of inner criticism that are coming up for you on a regular basis , and I just want you to write those sentences down on the piece of paper . For as long as it takes , just keep writing .

Don't write one or two and stop Like give it a good five minutes and just write them all down . And when you feel yourself starting to run out of steam , just ask yourself what else ? Think of another episode in your life , maybe from earlier in your life , where you try to do something big , and what were the things that came up right ?

So just keep writing , okay . And then the next question is I want you to just say whose voice is that and allow yourself to answer that question . And what I mean by that is did it sound like your mother ? Did it sound like your father ? Did it sound like a teacher you once had ? Did it sound like one of your friends ? Whose voice is it Right ?

The next question is when was the first time you can remember hearing it Right ? When was the first time in your life that you can remember that voice coming up ? The next question what is its intention ? What does it want from you ?

And when you answer that question on what is its intention , try to think of it through the lens of if it wasn't trying to do you harm . What might it be trying to do ? And answer it through that lens . Then I want you to say what does it want from you , what does it want you to do ?

And then I want you to answer the question and why might it want you to do that ? Then I want you to answer the question what is its agenda ? Then I want you to answer the question what is its job ? What does it think its goal in your life ? Then I want you to answer the question how might your inner critic actually be helping you ?

I know that might sound a little non-intuitive , but I think it's always good , when we're trying to do new things , to be measured in how we do that . So if you're someone who wants to go do something bold and new , it's very important to envision that upside , but I think it's equally important to be measured . You need to go after it and be all in on it .

But I also think it's helpful to do that in a way that you're caring for your downside too . So is it possible that your inner critic actually kind of has your back Right ? Just kind of think about those questions .

And the last thing that I want you to ask yourself is in what way is your inner critic through the course of your life , has your inner critic actually been a really good friend , you know , or tried to be a really good friend ?

And through this you're going to have to go through the lens of looking at the things that you wrote down , that it said to you , but then trying to look for the upside meaning of that . Like what might it be trying to do for you If it's telling you you're going to fail or you're never going to succeed ?

What it's really trying to do as a friend is to try to keep you from being disappointed , from putting yourself out there and spending a lot of time and maybe not succeeding . Or if it's criticizing your appearance and saying mean things to you about that , maybe it's trying in a really roundabout way to say you're not giving this your best shot , which you know .

Only you can answer the question whether that's true or not right .

But I believe that it's important to kind of try to look for the germ of the misguided advice that it's giving you , to try to look for the ways that it's actually trying to help . But obviously it isn't helping .

It's holding you back , but it's coming from a place of protection , usually , or it's coming from a place of wanting to keep you safe , or it's coming from a place of wanting you to , you know , to give it more effort , or to put your best self out there , or whatever you know , and it shows up all of us in so many different ways .

But I think it's really important to not see it as a part of our self that's trying to cause us harm . I think it's really important for us to learn how to understand it , to see where it's coming from , from , where its origins started and how , through the types of things that it tells us what it's actually trying to do in a very granted misguided way .

You know it might be trying to keep us safe , to keep us under its wing , but it might be doing that in a way that you know is saying things that are not very nice or that are really , you know , not true or whatever . So that's kind of the exercise I want you to go through is ask yourself those questions and do it through the lens of this .

Is your friend ? This is a version of you . Might be a misguided friend , it might be a friend who , you know , has some out of date ideas about who you are and what you're capable of , but at the end of the day , it's really just trying to keep you from harm and your job now is to be friended .

You don't have to spend a ton of time with it , you can only maybe you only choose to have cocktails with it once a year , you know , or whatever it's like .

You need to kind of get to know it and not resist it , because if you have an inner critic and I think we all do just for some it's louder than others and for some it's more persistent than others it's important to not let it stop you from the things that are calling to you , from your destiny .

But it is a part of you and so ignoring it and resisting it and pretending it's not there only just creates turmoil inside of you , and we want to be going after our dreams and living our life from a place of peace , from a place of acceptance . And that means accepting our positive , light filled side and accepting our flawed , dark filled side .

And that's where your inner for your inner critic comes from . It comes from the shadow part of you , you know , and the the darker part of you . But that doesn't mean it means harm , it doesn't .

And so I know this is a little more woo woo than I typically am , but it's very important work , and especially if you're someone who struggles with perfectionism or you struggle with imposter syndrome or you struggle with just a really nasty , persistent voice of self doubt and criticism that's always telling you you're not good enough , you're never enough .

This is important work . Give that critic a name , understand where it's coming from , what it's trying to do and when you're answering those questions , do it through the lens of how could it possibly be trying to help ? Don't be answering the question saying you know it's my mother or it's my first grade teacher and they always hated me .

That's not helpful , right ? It's like I want you , it's part of you . So assume that it's not trying to do damage . It's just super misguided and it's not evolved and it's not brave and it's not courageous and all it really wants you to do is keep breathing and be okay and to survive . You know , and that is it .

So the more you can get to know it , the more you can make peace with it , the more you can empathize with it and understand it , the easier it gets to , when you feel that voice flare up , to just say I hear you , but we're gonna do it anyway , and it'll just be quiet and go sit quietly in the corner watching .

Granted , it's waiting to tell you I told you so when you inevitably stub your toe . But you still don't have to listen to it . You just have to understand where it's coming from . It's kind of like having a friend that you love . You've been through a lot of things together . You really care about the person , but maybe you've outgrown them a little bit .

You know , I would look at your inner critic that way . You've grown beyond that fear , but you can appreciate what you two went through together and you can appreciate how angstful it must feel to be them right , have gratitude for them . Just don't have to listen to them , right . You can be kind to them .

You don't have to spend a ton of time with them , right , that is the exercise for today , and I know it's a little unusual , but believe me when I tell you the answer to dealing with your inner critic is not ignoring it . Here's what that leads to Overspending it means overdrinking .

All of the consumption behaviors that we do to keep ourselves busy are , in large part , to calm the feelings of angst and inner turmoil that have the roots in our inner critic , that negative inner talk track that is constantly looping in our minds throughout our life , sometimes louder than others .

And the key is not to ignore it , not to drink it away or eat it away or overspend it away .

The key is to see it , to appreciate it , to seek to understand it and to be aware of it so that the next time that it flares up , you're looking at it and you're saying literally in your mind , as soon as it starts in that negative cycle , that you're saying I hear you , but and I can appreciate where you're coming from but I'm gonna do it anyway .

So you go hang out over there and I'm going after this . Right , that is where I want you to get to . So I hope you found this episode helpful and if you are someone who feels like there's something big and something new calling to you and you've been saying no for a while . I want you to consider booking a call with me and talking to me about it .

I've got programs , one-on-one coaching and a group membership where I help people with this sort of thing , and I would love to talk to you about whatever you're feeling and helping you realize whatever dream it is that you have that you've been saying no to for a while , because I'm here to tell you it doesn't matter if you're the beginning of your corporate

journey , if you're the beginning of your business journey or if you are . You know , 40 years in , it is never too late to refire or reinvent . Life is waiting .

Life is waiting for you to choose it , and the only way that you're going to be as bold and as adventurous and , as you know , actualized as you dream of being , is by learning how to make peace and make friends , maybe distant friends with your inner critic , just knowing to tell it to that you appreciate it , but it's going to go sit over there at that table

in the corner while you go after it . Right ? That is the key . Then there's no need to over drink , there's no need to be angstful , there's no , you're not resisting anything . You're just telling it to be quiet while you focus in on the task at hand . So that is what I wanted to talk to you about today .

I hope you found this episode helpful and please , this week , take the time to give your inner critic a name , an alter ego . That is your alter ego and maybe you're not very helpful alter ego , and you know .

Spend some time getting to know it and thinking about what could it possibly be trying to do that's helpful , and then you know you'll know how to deal with it the next time it rears its ugly head . So that is what I wanted to talk to you about today , and with that I'll leave you till next time . Make it a great week .

My friends , do you have a life coach ? If not , I'd be so honored to be your coach . I've created a virtual coaching program and monthly membership called Next Level . Inside , we take the material you hear on this podcast , study it and then apply it . Join me at thepurposefulcareercom backslash next level . Don't forget the the purposefulcareercom backslash next level .

Join me and together we'll make your career and life everything you dream of . We'll see you there .