I had a nervous breakdown 15 years ago. Not due to serious failure, loss or disaster. No more calling me stupid. For making a mistake. In an online game.
Like the highly sensitive person (HSP)it affected me so much that I reached out to my friends and family to help them understand these painful emotions.
“Just let it wash away.”
“It’s just an online game.”
“Why are you so sensitive?”
And I agreed they were right. I decided it was stupid and I had to let it go.
But I couldn’t.
So why, despite all the good advice and my own rational decision, couldn’t I just let it go? Why did I feel like my whole world was falling apart and my heart was sinking into uncontrollable terror?
The answer came from the most unexpected place:
Myself.
In a moment of quiet reflection, I realized that what this person was saying to me, so bluntly and succinctly, sounded familiar. As much as I wanted to deny it or reject it, it was what I told myself my whole life. I tried to deny this inner voice, constantly telling me that I was stupid or unworthy.
Like what you’re reading? Get our newsletter for HSPs. An email every Friday. Click here to sign up!
I declared war on my inner critic
My inner critic had a lot to say about everything I did, and in the sea of messages about my worth there was… the central message standing tall and proud looking at me, “You’re not good enough… unless you’re perfect.”
If you’re like me, you spent most of your teenage years listening “Perfect” by Alanis Morissette repeating and bawling your eyes out at how true the lyrics are. (Morissette is a self-identified HSP.) That was the moment I truly felt understood and that I was not alone.
With this realization, on that day 15 years ago, I declared war on my inner critic. I made it my goal and firm commitment to destroy this voice that served no other purpose than to make me feel paralyzed and dysfunctional. I decided to find inner peace, even if it was the last thing I did in this life.
I left in the following years therapy and coachingI’ve done a lot of self-improvement, read every self-help book directly or marginally related, and anything else I could get my hands on to study this hideous monster – all in search of the perfect poison to put it in its place once and for all. Then I could laugh in his face and dance on his grave.
The parent-adult-child model
Through my intense studies and attempts, I discovered that it cannot be destroyed (much to my dismay).
But at this point I was introduced to a model that helped me understand what was happening, the so-called Parent-Adult-Child model. The creator of the model, a psychologist named Eric Berne, said that we have these three parts, similarly Freud Id, Ego and Superego.
He used this model to explain unhealthy dynamics between people, but I could apply it to my own inner critical voice. I realized that my inner critic stems from the messages I received growing up from parents, the adults in my life, and society in general. Working on my past and these negative biographies allowed me to get temporary relief to function normally as an adult.
But I’m still not cured. I was still sure there was something wrong with me.
I still didn’t have the inner peace I so longed for.
Need to soothe your sensitive nervous system?
HSPs often live with high levels of anxiety, sensory overload, and stress—and negative emotions can overwhelm us. But what if you finally felt at ease?
This is what you will find in it this effective online course Julie Bjelland, one of the best HSP therapists in the world. You will learn to turn off the racing thoughts, end the emotional outpouring, eliminate the sensory overload, and finally make room for your sensitive gifts to shine.
Stop feeling held back and start believing that you can handle anything. Check out this “HSP Toolbox” and start making changes today. Click here for more information.
My health collapsed
A few years ago, I went through a very stressful and intense period at work. I worked in a very fulfilling but extremely demanding job, and the extra hours and mental strain took a toll on my health. My inner critic pushed me hard to do more and more to compensate for my inexperience and unreliable health. I wanted my worth to shine and be recognized.
My health collapsed.
I don’t even remember what was worse: when the specialist told me that my newly diagnosed autoimmune diseases meant my body was attacking itself, or that there was no cure or treatment for them.
It reinforced my belief that there was something fundamentally wrong with me, and somehow I still broke.
Coincidentally, at the same time that I was told that there was no cure for my ailments, I began to receive information about holistic medicine from various sources. As Western medicine shrugged its shoulders and sent me on my way, I figured I had nothing to lose.
The more I learned about this holistic approach, the more I noticed a pattern in what everyone was saying: Sometimes physical symptoms have emotional causes. I instinctively knew this to be true, but about as much as any of us understand psychosomatic symptoms—we’ve all had a migraine after a terrible day at work or felt sick before a big public presentation.
Learning about the mind-body connection allowed me to understand that what was really happening wasn’t a sign that I was flawed or broken, but that I had repressed many unresolved emotions over the years. My body had no choice but to signal that I should view emotions in the way it best communicates to me: through physical symptoms.
This made me think about our nature, which as broken as it sometimes seems on the surface, is perfect. It is beautifully (and often excruciatingly painful) orchestrated to focus our attention on what really matters. My continued emotional work and release of repressed emotions has helped my symptoms decrease to almost nothing, reducing the back pain I have had throughout my life, as well as my sciatica and chronic fatigue symptoms. I completely replaced two boxes of painkillers a month with meditation and mindfulness.
What I Learned
This got me thinking: What if my inner critic, as painful as it was, was actually my mind’s perfectly orchestrated way of getting my attention? What if I misunderstand that this is a malfunctioning part of me that needs to be destroyed?
What if he was actually trying to get my attention to something else?
But what?
I returned to the years of therapy and my work on myself, I looked at the Parent-Adult-Child model and thought: If my inner criticism came from the voices of parents and adults as a child, WHO did you really talk to him?
And then it hit me: it was my inner child. Of course. This answer has been staring me in the face for years, trying to grab my attention. In my determined (and futile) work for that to destroy my inner critic, I missed the point he was trying to make all these years:
My inner critic wasn’t there to destroy me. It was there to make me aware of my inner child.
Like a flashlight in the dark, for years I turned the blinding light on my eyes and told him to go away. But really, the inner critic was trying to highlight my inner child, the fragile, vulnerable part of me that needed my attention so badly.
This is what allowed me to let go of the tension and control I was trying to place on my inner critic.
The moment I let go of the judgment against him and focused on what he had been trying to tell me over the years was the moment I was able to really connect with the child part that needed my love and attention.
When I really understood these parts of myself, it allowed me to focus on what was important. Not by using it to control and destroy a lot of my energy like I originally thought. But focusing on what it was trying to show me: that my inner child needs love, security and attention.
This is how I found my long-sought inner peace.
How to make peace with your inner critic
During my 15-year battle with my inner critic, I met many other people who were on a similar path. People who were smart, competent and sensitive and fought their own battles against their self-criticism. And then I thought: We spend so much energy trying to control, destroy, silence, or suppress our inner critic…what if instead we could use that energy in any way we wanted in a way that felt productive, empowered, and flowing…what could we accomplish as a group, as a society? As humanity?
That’s why I decided to leave my successful corporate job and dedicate myself to a higher purpose: helping others find peace with their inner critics. I want to take a look at how you can start doing this for yourself:
- The inner critical process is automatic. This happens in the blink of an eye: one moment we are fine, and the next we are involved in harsh self-criticism.
- However, automatic doesn’t mean that unchangeable.
- By understanding this, we can take the (remote) control and play this automatic process in slow motion so we can pinpoint the exact moment the inner critic kicks in. Can you identify the first critical message that appeared?
- If we are hard on ourselves, we fall into an emotional child state. This is because the actual The purpose of the inner critic is to point out our inner child. But don’t take my word for it. Look at yourself and see if you feel like a “child” emotionally when your inner critic comes up.
- By understanding this, we have a real opportunity to change the outcome of this automatic process. Instead of automatically starting a downward spiral of negative self-talk (which uses a significant source of energy), we can choose let’s acknowledge that our inner critic is talking to our inner child and focus instead on what our inner child needs.
- Develop your own new inner dialogue. This dialogue does not reject the inner critic, but instead acknowledges the important role it plays and directs our attention to the real part that needs support.
You can turn inward and say (in your own words), “Hey Inner Critic, thanks for showing up. I understand that if you’re here, it means my inner child needs me. Thanks for your message, and now that you have fulfilled your important role of speaking for my inner childI want her to know that I’ll take it from here and be there for her. Dear inner child, what do you need now? in order to feel safe, loved and nurtured? How can I support you?”
If the process of coming to terms with your inner critic resonates with you, and you want to take the steps that lead to it yourself, get my free e-book, the so-called 7 Tools to Prepare Your Inner Critic In my e-book, I describe the effective healing tools that supported me on my own journey, as well as the inner transformations of my clients.
You might also like:
This article contains affiliate links. We only recommend products that we truly believe in.
