Should You Embrace Or Reject Your Inner Critic?

This is an excerpt of a blog comment I just wrote on a beautiful blog post. I thought it may be helpful for you. See original comment.  And please leave me a comment or send me a private message on the SelfLoveU Facebook Page telling me how this work is affecting you (I am the only one who sees it and your message will be confidential, unless you give me permission to share). I love hearing from you. It keeps me going.

Embrace the negative or eject it? I know it’s important that we embrace our whole selves, however, I feel that parts of us that are divided against the well being of the whole (even if they’re trying to protect us), should be kicked out, separated, banished, shoved against the wall, kicked to the moon.

That Imago Interject is the voice of the abuse. It’s insidious. When you are hurting inside and in pain because of something your subconscious is telling you… things you were taught about yourself as a child, under all the layers, keep repeating themselves over and over and repeating the trauma. We’re programmed to do it to ourselves. The pain our wounded child feels is the result of these false messages. It’s despair.

There is no power in despair. But, there is power in anger. Even the body response is different, more alert, upright and ready for action. Tapping into our anger inside against the false messages that are inside. Getting mad at the injustice our own hearts spew without conscious awareness. Standing up to the Inner Critic has helped me to access my own power and given me the ability to set boundaries within and without against criticism and conditional love.

My Inner Critic is never sad, confused or angry. It is just cognitively and constantly saying that I’m not good enough. It doesn’t go that deep, however, it wounds deep. My Inner Critic is not in my limbic, it’s in my Cerebral Cortex. It’s the judgment piece, which takes critical thinking, which is higher level, more cerebral than the wounds of my inner child (the emotional part).

I love the way Peter Walker, MA Psychotherapist explains how to deal with the inner critic. I’ve read it many, many times.

http://www.pete-walker.com/shrinkingInnerCritic.htm

Once I started rebelling against the negative inner voices, I stopped hurting. There was no hurt in that area for the inner child to be hurt. It feels like I embraced the hurt not by holding onto it, but by kicking butt internally. Stopping the bleeding. Standing up to the Inner Critic has made all the difference. 1000s of little hurts, but one at a time.

Core Wounds

Core wounds are wounds that occurred in childhood. These are wounds that happen when one is not tended to properly as a child through neglect, abuse or maltreatment. Parents can damage the core essence of their children without even knowing it. Some caretakers are deficit in their own needs and are unable to give to their child. In fact, the way our culture raises children leads to much core wounding among us all. Everyone has core wounds at some level--some have it worse than others.

The core wound is experienced as deep-level pain due to some unmet childhood development need.  This pain is triggered in current day situations when you encounter a similar situation or dynamic. It's the deep stuff that surfaces when you face difficult losses in life. It's the pain that is beneath the pain. The emotion that's fueling all emotions. It's the pain that drives one to drink, smoke, take drugs, gamble, shop or addictive relationships.

Core wounds include rejection, abandonment, betrayal, loss, injustice and the like. When our needs are not met as children, we experience the core wound and we experience toxic shame. We believe that because we were rejected or abandoned or that we lost a parent or a friend, that we are bad. We turn the external maltreatment internal and onto ourselves. The wound produces beliefs. These beliefs are what perpetuate the wound over and over and over until we die or the wound is healed.


People do anything to avoid their core wounds. Core wounds are the lie that says:

"You're not good enough."
"You're incompetent."
"Nobody loves you."
"You are worthless."

These voices in both your subconscious and conscious mind repeat over and over in myriad ways throughout your life unless they are healed. You will find yourself getting into scenarios again and again that prove your false beliefs to be true. Your core wounds are the fuel for false beliefs.

Healing the core wounds takes a lot of devastating work; much personal destruction and rebuilding. It is a painful process, but in the healing you find pieces of yourself you didn't know you needed. In the center of the core wound you find the parts of yourself that you needed in order to discontinue the wounding. These parts of you are frozen, blocked in a centrifuge of pain, shame, anger, rage, humiliation, rejection and self-hatred. This wound perpetuates itself like a cancer through your body, heart, soul and mind. This wound effects your perceptions, feelings, behaviors and life. The thing you need to protect you against this core wounding is located at the very center of the pain. The key to setting you free is found at the center of the wound. If you want healing, you have to go into the eye of the storm.

18 Schemas: Healing Your Negative Core Beliefs

This article shares the 18 schemas as referred to in my previous article. Schemas are networks of core beliefs that you hold about yourself based upon the meeting of your needs in childhood. If your needs were adequately met (or met good enough), then you will have healthy schemas--a positive view of yourself, others and life. If your childhood development needs were not properly met, or if you suffered from childhood trauma or abuse, neglect or suffered from a loss of a parent, then you will have beliefs about yourself that do not serve you. Negative core beliefs are the product of inadequate parenting.

When you do not get your needs met as a child, you determine that you're not worthy to be taken care of. Depending on which needs were thwarted, you may have several schemas--groups of negative core beliefs--that are working against you today.

It does not matter how things have changed in your life, if you do not heal the schema associated with the negative core beliefs you hold in your psyche, you will always have an underlying sense of defectiveness, inability or unlovability. Until you actively pursue healing to build a new schema in place of the old maladaptive beliefs, you are at mercy of old, archaic beliefs that are not valid, not logical and not true.

Here is a list of 18 Schemas from the website SchemaTherapy.comhttp://www.schematherapy.com/id73.htm.

1. ABANDONMENT /  INSTABILITY 
The perceived instability or unreliability of those available for support and connection. Involves the sense that significant others will not be able to continue providing emotional support, connection, strength, or practical protection because they are emotionally unstable and unpredictable (e.g., angry outbursts), unreliable, or erratically present; because they will die imminently; or because they will abandon the patient in favor of someone better.

2. MISTRUST / ABUSE
The expectation that others will hurt, abuse, humiliate, cheat, lie, manipulate, or take advantage.  Usually involves the perception that the harm is intentional or the result of unjustified and extreme negligence. May include the sense that one always ends up being cheated relative to others or "getting the short end of the stick."
3.  EMOTIONAL DEPRIVATION
Expectation that one's desire for a normal degree of emotional support will not be adequately met by others.  The three major forms of deprivation are:

A. Deprivation of Nurturance:  Absence of attention, affection, warmth, or companionship.

B. Deprivation of Empathy:  Absence of understanding, listening, self-disclosure, or mutual sharing of feelings from others.

C. Deprivation of Protection:  Absence of strength, direction, or guidance from others.
 
4.  DEFECTIVENESS / SHAME
The feeling that one is defective, bad, unwanted, inferior, or invalid in important respects; or that one would be unlovable to significant others if exposed. May involve hypersensitivity to criticism, rejection, and blame; self-consciousness, comparisons, and insecurity around others; or a sense of shame regarding one's perceived flaws. These flaws may be private (e.g., selfishness, angry impulses, unacceptable sexual desires) or public (e.g., undesirable physical appearance, social awkwardness).

5.  SOCIAL ISOLATION / ALIENATION  
The feeling that one is isolated from the rest of the world, different from other people, and/or not part of any group or community.
 
6.  DEPENDENCE / INCOMPETENCE
Belief that one is unable to handle one's everyday responsibilities in a competent manner, without considerable help from others (e.g., take care of oneself, solve daily problems, exercise good judgment, tackle new tasks, make good decisions). Often presents as helplessness.
 
7.  VULNERABILITY TO HARM OR ILLNESS
Exaggerated fear that imminent catastrophe will strike at any time and that one will be unable to prevent it. Fears focus on one or more of the following: (A) Medical Catastrophes:  e.g., heart attacks, AIDS;  (B) Emotional Catastrophes:  e.g., going crazy;  (C): External Catastrophes: e.g., elevators collapsing, victimized by criminals, airplane crashes, earthquakes.

8.  ENMESHMENT  /  UNDEVELOPED SELF
Excessive emotional involvement and closeness with one or more significant others (often parents), at the expense of full individuation or normal social development. Often involves the belief that at least one of the enmeshed individuals cannot survive or be happy without the constant support of the other. May also include feelings of being smothered by, or fused with, others  OR  insufficient individual identity. Often experienced as a feeling of emptiness and floundering, having no direction, or in extreme cases questioning one's existence.  

9.  FAILURE TO ACHIEVE
The belief that one has failed, will inevitably fail, or is fundamentally inadequate relative to one's peers, in areas of achievement (school, career, sports, etc.). Often involves beliefs that one is stupid, inept, untalented, ignorant, lower in status, less successful than others, etc.

10.  ENTITLEMENT / GRANDIOSITY 
The belief that one is superior to other people; entitled to special rights and privileges; or not bound by the rules of reciprocity that guide normal social interaction. Often involves insistence that one should be able to do or have whatever one wants, regardless of what is realistic, what others consider reasonable,  or the cost to others;OR an exaggerated focus on superiority (e.g., being among  the most successful,  famous, wealthy)  -- in order to achieve power or control (not primarily for attention or approval). Sometimes includes excessive competitiveness toward, or domination of, others:  asserting one's power, forcing one's point of view, or controlling the behavior of others in line with one's own desires---without empathy or concern for others' needs or feelings.

11. INSUFFICIENT SELF-CONTROL / SELF-DISCIPLINE
Pervasive difficulty or refusal to exercise sufficient self-control and frustration tolerance to achieve one's personal goals, or to restrain the excessive expression of one's emotions and impulses. In its milder form, patient presents with an exaggerated emphasis on discomfort-avoidance:  avoiding pain, conflict, confrontation, responsibility, or overexertion---at the expense of personal fulfillment, commitment,  or integrity.

12.  SUBJUGATION
Excessive surrendering of control to others because one feels coerced - - usually to avoid anger, retaliation, or abandonment. The two major forms of subjugation are:

A. Subjugation of Needs:  Suppression of one's preferences, decisions,  and desires.

B. Subjugation of Emotions: Suppression of emotional expression, especially anger.

Usually involves the perception that one's own desires, opinions,  and feelings are not valid or important to others. Frequently presents as excessive compliance, combined with hypersensitivity to feeling trapped. Generally leads to a build up of anger, manifested in maladaptive symptoms (e.g., passive-aggressive behavior, uncontrolled outbursts of temper, psychosomatic symptoms, withdrawal of affection, "acting out", substance abuse).

13. SELF-SACRIFICE 
Excessive focus on voluntarily meeting the needs of others in daily situations, at the expense of one's own gratification.  The most common reasons are:  to prevent causing pain to others;  to avoid guilt from feeling selfish;  or to maintain the connection with others perceived as needy .  Often results from an acute sensitivity to the pain of others. Sometimes leads to a sense that one's own needs are not being adequately met and to resentment of those who are taken care of. (Overlaps with concept of codependency.)

14.  APPROVAL-SEEKING  /  RECOGNITION-SEEKING
Excessive emphasis on gaining approval, recognition, or attention from other people, or fitting in, at the expense of developing a secure and true sense of self. One's sense of esteem is dependent primarily on the reactions of others rather than on one's own natural inclinations.  Sometimes includes an overemphasis on status, appearance, social acceptance, money, or achievement --  as means of gaining approval, admiration, or attention (not primarily for power or control). Frequently results in major life decisions that are inauthentic or unsatisfying;  or in hypersensitivity to rejection.
 
15. NEGATIVITY  /  PESSIMISM
A pervasive, lifelong focus on the negative aspects of life (pain, death, loss, disappointment, conflict, guilt, resentment, unsolved problems, potential mistakes, betrayal, things that could go wrong, etc.) while minimizing or neglecting the positive or optimistic aspects. Usually includes an exaggerated expectation-- in a wide range of work, financial, or interpersonal situations -- that things will eventually go seriously wrong, or that aspects of one's life that seem to be going well will ultimately fall apart. Usually involves an inordinate fear of making mistakes that might lead to: financial collapse, loss, humiliation, or being trapped in a bad situation. Because potential negative outcomes are exaggerated, these patients are frequently characterized by chronic worry, vigilance, complaining, or indecision.

16.  EMOTIONAL INHIBITION The excessive inhibition of spontaneous action, feeling, or communication -- usually to avoid disapproval by others, feelings of shame, or losing control of one's impulses. The most common areas of inhibition involve:  (a) inhibition of anger & aggression;  (b) inhibition of positive impulses (e.g., joy, affection, sexual excitement, play);  (c) difficulty expressing vulnerability or communicating freely about one's feelings, needs, etc.;  or (d) excessive emphasis on rationality while disregarding emotions.

17.  UNRELENTING STANDARDS /  HYPERCRITICALNESS  
The underlying belief that one must strive to meet very high internalized standards of behavior and performance, usually to avoid criticism. Typically results in feelings of pressure or difficulty slowing down; and in hypercriticalness toward oneself and others.  Must involve significant impairment in:  pleasure, relaxation, health, self-esteem, sense of accomplishment, or satisfying relationships. 

Unrelenting standards typically present as:  (a) perfectionism, inordinate attention to detail, or an underestimate of how good one's own performance is relative to the norm;  (b) rigid rules and “shoulds” in many areas of life, including unrealistically high moral, ethical, cultural, or religious precepts; or (c) preoccupation with time and efficiency, so that more can be accomplished.
 
18.  PUNITIVENESS  
The belief that people should be harshly punished for making mistakes.  Involves the tendency to be angry, intolerant,  punitive, and impatient with those people (including oneself) who do not meet one's expectations or standards.  Usually includes difficulty forgiving mistakes in oneself or others, because of a reluctance to consider extenuating circumstances, allow for human imperfection, or empathize with feelings.

(c) Jeffrey Young Schema Therapy Institute

561 10th Ave., Suite 43D

New York, NY  10036