Disarming a Critic
Making visible and dismantling our self-limiting beliefs
How visual tools can assist us in unpacking and mitigating the influence of our mental structures.
Self study: A critic’s attempt to keep me “in line” and safely “in bounds.”
“It feels like a blade that swings back and forth, across the top of an imaginary box and if I start to go or grow outside the box, I get cut off.” In a peer session of Compassionate Inquiry (CI), I shared my perception of my inner critic, after being asked how I experience it. “It’s sharp. It cuts me off from speaking if I say something that feels off, incorrect, or not enough.” And I added, “I’m not sure where it gets the standard.”
How can I loosen its grip so it no longer has so much power in these situations? The critic was a familiar part of my life story. Over time, I’ve gotten to know it and how it shows up. The fact that it showed up again was a surprise and an opportunity for inquiry and experimentation.
The process of Compassionate Inquiry, a psycho-therapeutic approach developed by Gabor Mate and Sat Dharam, has been a helpful technique for me to face my challenges and unveil mysterious riddles that keep me stuck — the hidden stories, mindsets, and assumptions that I carry. In a peer session, I was able to process a recent event where I froze under pressure and wanted to understand the parts of me that got in the way. We explored the event that triggered fear, the beliefs I was holding, and how a critic showed up and responded. I shared stories of my past and we found the points of origin of how this critic likely formed and how it supported me at that time.
After the CI peer session, I felt a lot better. I took a moment to jot down some notes in my journal — emotions present, aspects of the story and origin that resonated, and also the perception of the experience. Here is what I drew.
Self-study: Intuitive sketch after a peer practice CI session
Sketching it helped me in a few ways:
It was a powerful mirror. It was an intuitive sketch and I was surprised at what I drew. I could then observe and explore my perception of my critic and the parts of myself affected.
It created some space between me and my critic. I was not my critic. “It’s a process that is happening inside me,” as Gabor Mate often reminds us, and the process is more or less autonomic.
It brought compassion. The new awareness allowed me to have more compassion for these parts of myself, both my critic and how I might be affected.
I could now work with it. It became a metaphor I could work with, in my own process and also in other healing sessions. Journaling helped me understand its nature and release the emotions around it.
Critics and limiting beliefs are relatable as many of us have them in some form or another. They are often shifty, elusive, and slippery — ducking under the cover of our unconscious and autonomic nervous system as much as possible. By making these beliefs and their characteristics visible, we can face them directly. Often naming and making them visible can create a shift and release some of the power they hold on us. Additionally, we can bring in other resources and processes to work with them and further our goals.
Client study: A critic’s attempt to prioritize safety over failure
For example, I was working with a client who wanted to move forward in her career path to “embody her soul dance,” yet for years she felt stuck. The map below came together after a few sessions and helped to reveal how different critics interacted and contributed to her stagnation. She shared a metaphor of her experience and the discomfort she felt in her body. '“Like a newly repotted plant, there is a pull outwards and urge to grow towards my potential. On the inside, I’m bursting forth and wanting to share my gifts with the world, yet I am constrained.”
Over two sessions, there were several mentions of moving forward and then hitting brick walls, followed by grief. Loss of life force and trust in herself were also themes. I jotted down all the associated beliefs during the sessions and later mapped them to the metaphor provided of the plant.
Drawing these out helped me see a possible pattern, like an assessment tool, from which to create a more integrated solution and holistic approach. The map created a shared language and visual tool for my client and me to partner in conversation and on the next steps. For example, we could examine and challenge the limiting beliefs with “incisive questions" from Kline’s thinking model (1999), explore their origins using Compassionate Inquiry, or bring in resources and rewrite the narrative. In most cases, an experiential map helps to bring more compassion to the process and how these limiting beliefs and mental structures may be affecting our growth and well-being.