Breaking The Power of Self-Limiting Beliefs -Birth of Our Inner Critic - Part 1

Unraveling the Power of Your Inner Critic

"I can do it!"

(Spoken in the voice of a determined 3-year-old)

Like all children, you and I said that when we were about 3. With unfortunate exceptions, we are born with an inherent (wired-in) life-forwarding “I can” energy.

That energy empowered us to be curious, creative, resilient, and adventurous. It was thrilling for us to reach and touch things, to make them move or squeak. Without a coach, we learned to tuck an arm and turn over. We crawled without any training. We walked, fell, and got up to try again. Our body’s “I can” energy is life-forwarding. It is designed to become our “I will” resilient, creative energy.

Hopefully, caregivers encouraged our “I can” energy and helped us mature our adventurous “I will” grit and stretch beyond our limits. Unfortunately, that did not always happen. Even when it did, we began experiencing emotional shocks that started to block our “I can” life-forwarding energy.

"No one leaves childhood without exit wounds!"

All physical, emotional, or sexual abuse creates a trauma response embedded in our body’s neurological system.

Sadly, too many infants and children experience horrific abuse in their formative years and enter adult life with unresolved trauma wounds. It does not take extreme abuse to create a “process trauma” that blocks our life-forwarding energy. Little shocks to our life-forwarding have a negative impact: neglecting our need for food and our diaper changed, being angry with us for our everyday needs and behaviors, or handling us roughly by taking their frustrations out on us.

Before we have words to express our feelings or experiences, our body begins to keep score. We unconsciously create defenses to protect ourselves from more harm. Our “I can” energy moves us forward until we run into experiences that shock what our neurological system was expecting.

It seems that of our earliest defenses is to figure out logically what we need to logically “fix” to avoid more surprises. We try to fix our behavior so we won’t upset caregivers, deny our own needs, or hide our sad/angry feelings by being happy. We try to fix others so they will be happy.

All the time, we are not realizing that the real issue to address is in the roots of our past experiences.

Two Examples:

Two children fall on the playground. Both run to their caregivers for comfort.

One caregiver acknowledges the hurt, cleans it, and kisses the boo-boo. They encourage the child to go back to play more." The other caregiver seems interrupted. "What's the big deal? You're OK. Don’t be a sissy! Get back out there. Don’t be so clumsy."

Both children had the same "shock" and potential blockage to their energy. The first child can now freely play "wiser" with the blockage resolved. The second child was not given adequate emotional resources to resolve the shock and emotional blockage. They return constricted and cautious, looking at their caregiver to see if they are smiling or frowning. The blockage diverts their energy into "figuring out how to avoid that shaming again.”

Birth of our Inner Critic

As children, teens, and adults, we may experience our Inner Critic attacking or against us.

An Inner Critic is born in the voices of essential adults demeaning us as: "too stupid, too bad, too clumsy, or too much trouble." The messages are like knives cutting our souls, leaving affirmations to leak out. It may be either their words or their actions that communicate these painful messages.

We begin to internalize their "You can't" as "I can't," and our Inner Critic is always around to remind us in case some of our “I can” energy slips through to create a desire for action outside our comfort zone.

Our Inner Critic often sounds like an adult voice talking to us as if we are still a child, no matter our age. It warns us how dangerous it is to do something new or different outside our comfort zone.

Here’s the Good News

Our inherent life-forwarding energy - our “I Can” energy - is still in us, waiting and striving to be unblocked.

That “I can” energy continues to push against what’s blocking it from moving forward. That pressure creates the discomfort and discontent we experience with living below our potential. If our Inner Critic warns us against stepping outside the walls of our comfort zone, it’s only because “something else in us wants to resolve that emotional block to move our life forward.”

Watch for Part 2: The Virus in Our Emotional Operating System

Want Help In Breaking Self-Limiting Beliefs?

I offer individual coaching and some group classes that teach skills you can use independently for a lifetime of overcoming self-limiting beliefs and your Inner Critic.

Let’s work together to free your inherent life-forwarding energy to create the future you want for yourself and the people you love.

Contact me at drpaul@heartconnexion.org for more information and options.

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