Hello writers!
In this episode I’m going to talk about something that plagues every single scholar I’ve ever met, and that is their inner critic.
You know what I’m talking about.
It’s that voice—or set of voices—in your head that unleash a stream of negative thoughts about you or your work that can quickly demoralize and demotivate you.
Inner critic thoughts that used to plague me when I was writing my first book included things like:
“You have no idea what you’re doing.”
“You work way too slowly and are falling so far behind!”
And, my favorite, because it came up so much and would completely tank my spirit, “Everyone else is so much more productive than you, so why even try?”
If you had a friend who was struggling with writing, you would undoubtedly support and encourage them to keep going. But with yourself, it’s easy to give free rein to hurtful thoughts that stop you in your tracks.
In this episode I’m going to give you some ways to understand your inner critic and defuse its power by doing some exercises.
It may seem counterintuitive, but the key is not to get angry or try to get rid of it.
Instead, it’s about seeing the positive intent these thoughts have for you and treating them—and therefore yourself—with respect, gentleness, and compassion.
In other words, your writing can feel much easier and more satisfying if you befriend your inner critic.
Get to Know Your Inner Critic
There is something about the act of book writing that riles up our inner critics much, much more than normal.
In a faculty workshop I recently did, one writer said her inner critic always says things like, “You are wrong. Your ideas are worthless. Why would anyone take you seriously?”
Ouch!
Imagine having to maintain your motivation to write after all that negative internal dialogue.
Whether someone is writing a research-based book or a fiction novel, pretty much all new authors experience incredible self-doubt and anxiety about their work.
This is because when you’re writing a book, you are putting yourself on the page.
Your words, ideas, and beliefs are placed under a vastly different spotlight than when you’re writing a co-authored piece or a journal article that will be safely tucked away behind a paywall, mostly inaccessible to a wider audience (a practice that I think is a total scam, by the way, but I digress).
With a book, there’s really nowhere to hide.
This is why so many new scholarly authors try to shield themselves behind the ideas of more established scholars, which I talked about in the last episode.
But if you want to write a book that makes a splash and actually transforms the way people think or inspires them to take action, you will be making bold claims that your ideal audience will love… which others might totally disagree with or even disparage.
Your Thoughts Create Your Results
Later in this episode, I’m going to give you an exercise you can use to manage your inner critic.
But first, I’d like to start by talking about how your thoughts create your results.
It’s like self-fulfilling prophecies. When you label yourself or your work negatively, your results are probably going to fit your predictions.
This also works the other way around. When you view yourself positively, you’re much more likely to achieve your goals and faster as well.
What I find sad is that academia generally does not encourage people, especially folks from marginalized backgrounds, to view ourselves positively.
We have our ideas torn apart so often that, over time, it’s easy to mistake external critical voices as our own.
People stop trusting themselves to do good work or they think that constant self-berating or comparing themselves to others is a natural part of getting things done.
So many faculty I’ve worked with have told me they felt like they had much more confidence as writers and scholars when they were in college.
There is a whole structure that keeps people from claiming their expertise until they’ve proven that they know more about a topic than nearly anyone else on the planet.
These are insane standards!
But we internalize them as normal, and they become part of the noise that fills our heads.
I’m here to tell you it can feel a lot better than this!
I come from a school of thought that believes all circumstances are neutral.
It’s our thoughts about our circumstances that make us feel one way or another and ultimately lead to certain actions and outcomes.
So when it comes to writing—or honestly, really any area—you can achieve your goals in one of two ways.
The first is through sheer willpower and pushing hard against your inner critic.
However, this is like trying to drive a car with one foot pressed down hard on the gas pedal and the other pressed down on the brake.
It’s torturous and slow.
Or you can give yourself grace and proactively choose more positive thoughts that are still believable to you.
And if you do this consistently, you are far more likely to reach your goals and be in a much better mood along the way.
So let’s become more aware of your internal dialogue and start distinguishing between your inner critic thoughts and your wisest Self who knows you are enough already.
Clean vs. Dirty Pain
One way to start making sense of all of this and make writing feel better is through the concept of clean pain vs. dirty pain.
In a nutshell, “clean pain” is suffering that comes from sheer human existence. In our lives, we invariably face difficult circumstances and challenges. These can include things like going through a break-up, losing a job, a loved one dying, health issues, etc.
And yes, it also includes the challenges of writing a book, particularly if you’ve never done it before.
Clean pain can hurt very deeply, but it reflects the reality of the situation at hand.
By contrast, “dirty pain” is the meaning your mind attaches to the painful situation. It’s when you ruminate on things like blame or shame or you fixate on what you could have done differently to prevent the situation in the first place.
It makes the pain last so much longer and feels much worse than the actual circumstances.
Let me use the example of a big break-up I went through when I was a graduate student. I was 31 years old and felt ready to settle down.
I was looking for something or someone to anchor my life and my future, which felt so precarious when I was struggling through my dissertation and didn’t know what the job market might bring.
I started dating an assistant professor who was a complete and total workaholic. And needless to say, we initially bonded over our work.
Although we were compatible in a number of ways, it soon became clear that he was always going to put his work ahead of our relationship, which was a deal breaker for me.
So we broke up, which was the clean pain.
Now, instead of accepting the circumstances, letting go, and moving forward, I held onto the dirty pain.
I resented him. I blamed him for ruining my life. I felt wronged. I wanted him to apologize, and decided until that happened, I wasn’t going to have closure.
Even though we weren’t even in contact anymore, the dirty pain that stemmed from my own thoughts about the situation stuck around long after the relationship ended.
I made my life so much harder through the story I told myself about the break-up.
And the result was that I was miserable for years longer than necessary, while he had completely moved on with his life.
So what does this have to do with your inner critic and book writing?
Writing a book is an objectively hard thing to do, which is clean pain. However, dirty pain shows up as the negative thoughts you attach to yourself and your writing.
For example, you might be working on a chapter and making very slow progress. The clean pain is the reality that writing a chapter is hard, and some are even harder than others.
Dirty pain would be judging and berating yourself for not being further along. And from there, it’s really easy to spiral down into negative thoughts that keep the dirty pain alive and crush your spirit.
These thoughts can turn an otherwise neutral situation into something that becomes symbolic of things you perceive as character flaws.
Or it’s a way for you compare yourself to others negatively and to denigrate your own objective achievements and abilities.
And all of this dirty pain comes from your inner critic.
Another way of thinking about this is through the Buddhist metaphor of “two arrows.” Being shot by the first arrow is like pain that is caused by a difficult life event or circumstance.
The second arrow is our reaction to the pain of the first arrow. It’s all the negative emotions and thoughts our minds conjure up in relation to the circumstance that might actually have nothing to do with the situation itself.
We can’t always control the first arrow, but the second arrow is optional.
Befriend Your Inner Critic
Oftentimes harsh thoughts about ourselves become so engrained in our minds that they just run as a semi-conscious loop. They feel so natural that we don’t even think to challenge them and just accept them as fact.
But rather than resist them, I’d like you to consider for a moment that these internal messages are actually trying to help you.
Their intent could be to push you to work harder.
Or maybe they’re trying to keep you safe –keep in mind this is not from your perspective, but from their perspective–by preventing you from releasing your work and therefore not exposing yourself to criticism.
Your inner critic thoughts have likely helped you get to where you are now by lighting a fire under your butt.
But there also comes a point where they’re no longer useful, and instead become obstacles in the way of us achieving our goals.
So here’s a mindfulness exercise that will help you gently and compassionately work with, rather than against, your inner critic when you’re writing.
When you feel doubt or anxiety start to creep up during a writing session, try the following five step process.
#1: First, recognize when you’re not feeling good about writing.
Sometimes we’re so used to not feeling good that we think it’s our natural state. It is not. One tell-tale sign is that some part of your body feels really tense or anxious. You might have a headache or a knot in your stomach.
#2: Identify the negative thought that’s triggering this feeling.
Jot it down on a piece of paper so you can start to separate it from yourself.
#3: Pause and consciously take at least three deep breaths.
Flood your system with oxygen and allow the tense, contracted parts of you open up and feel more spacious.
#4: Recognize that you don’t have to believe this thought.
And, this might be challenging, but I’d like you to try it: send some gratitude to your inner critic for trying to motivate you and make you successful in the ways it knows how.
#5: And finally, commit to starting again.
It can help to repeat a mantra or a new thought that feels kinder or more inspiring to you, such as “I don’t need to have it all figured out yet” or “Writing is hard work and I’m doing it anyway.”
When you treat yourself with compassion rather than judgment, it’s easier to regain your momentum and not jump on the train to negative thoughtland.
So always remind yourself that your inner critic is trying to help you out in some way, even when the thoughts in your head feel super painful.
And remember that thoughts are things. You don’t have to believe everything you think just because you’ve believed it in the past.
Every new moment is an opportunity to start again.
Talk to you next time!