Five Tips for Shaking off Your Inner Critic

We all have times when the voice in our heads starts talking to us. You can call that voice the noisy roommate or the inner critic. But my question is how do you cope with it? What is your mantra to silence that inner voice? What are the ways to shake it off?

These are my tried and true techniques for silencing that inner critic and letting yourself shine.

1. Recognize your inner voice
2. Practice self-compassion
3. Breathe
4. Have a mantra
5. Tune in to a favorite song

Recognize Your Inner Voice

Sometimes when our inner voice starts talking, it’s hard to differentiate between what it’s saying and what is true.

For example, I always have more ambitions for myself than I’m able to accomplish in a day or in an hour. My internal list of things I’d like to get done is way longer than what I can reasonably expect to do. So it’s easy for my inner voice to criticize what I actually get done. My accomplishments seem to be “less than”.

In these moments, I recognize my inner critic, and I laugh (for tips on how to find your laugh again, check this article out). Laughing helps me remember that what others see and experience is totally different from my internal critic.

I also ask myself: Did I make progress against my goal (one thing that works for me is to re-frame my accomplishments to focus on what I did rather than what I did not do)? More important than did I knock everything off my to-do list is was I kind? Was I able to be there, present in the moment, for friends and family and colleagues? Did I look after myself? This leads me to my next point.

Practice Self-Compassion

The news about coronavirus is stressful. People are suffering, some are dying. The virus is equal opportunity – anyone can be infected. And we are slower than we should be about staying home and keeping a physical distance between ourselves and our neighbours. We are all in this together, but everyone’s reaction to the situation is different.

In a recent conversation, someone asked me what I thought was meant by self-compassion. They were really struggling with what this means in practical terms. I define self-compassion as being as kind to yourself as you are to others. Treating yourself with as much grace as you would afford another person.

So imagine that someone else was telling you their story, and you were helping them to re-frame what they did accomplish vs what they didn’t. Give yourself that same break.

Be kind to yourself.

Kindness is so important.

Breathe

My sister, Rachel, has learned a lot about different approaches to improve wellness. She’s a big advocate of heart math, which boiled down to its simplest essence, is mainly about breathing. By the way, it’s even more effective if you smile while you breathe.

When I need a little reset, I open my free Pranayama breathing app [available on Apple or Google] and I breathe along with the sounds for 7 mins.

I like to do this when I’m not driving and I put my right hand on skin-on-skin above my heart, close my eyes, smile, and breathe.

This breathing exercise helps to reset your nervous system, and puts you into a state that you can access when you need it. The smile actually creates the same chemical reaction in your body as smiling in response to something.

You can actually create your own happiness by smiling before you feel happy!

The more you practice, the easier it gets to access this state of mind on demand.

Have a mantra you repeat to yourself

If I start to get overwhelmed, or frozen, I like to tell myself one of the following:

• Take it step by step
• Do your best. Your best is good enough.
• Tomorrow is a new day.

‘Step by step’ works for me as a mantra because I can break an activity down into smaller tasks. Then focus on getting the next task done. And then the next and then the next.  And using this approach helps me make noticeable progress.

My second mantra is that “I am doing my best” – whatever that looks like on a given day – is all I can really ask of myself, and this gives me permission to let go of perfection, and just strive to do the best I can. In fact, Rachel wrote a great post about this mantra.

Finally, “tomorrow is a new day’ is also one of my favorite mantras. It reminds me that while I may be having a rough day today or not getting as much done as I would like to, things will be fresh and new tomorrow and I can start again.

I came across this article Mantras to Boost your Confidence on Thrive Global recently which has some great alternate mantras in it as well. I encourage you to figure out what your mantras are, and have them in your “go-to” rotation, whenever you need to silence your noisy inner critic.

Tune in to a favorite song

Depending on what I need, I have a few songs on my playlist that I turn to when I need a little more mojo. At the moment, I like:

• Rachel Platten’s Fight Song
• Taylor Swift’s Shake It Off
• Black Eyes Peas’ I Gotta Feeling

Pick anything that works for you and fills your heart and mind with uplifting energy. It will also silence that voice in your head and give you a little breather from the inner critic. Music can also help you perform under pressure. When the song is done, your mind will be clearer and you’ll be able to focus on the task at hand.

So the next time your inner critic starts chirping in your mind, try these tips.

And let us know in the comments section below: what tips do you have for shaking off your inner critic?

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