Are you aware that at this very moment here in this place, there is a Fear Monger all around! It spreads seeds of doubt and angst and can take the joy out of anything, and…and, it lives right inside your head!
Yup, inside that unheard conversation and rambling of your mind. Take a look right now.
Any tinges of worry, anxiety, negative chatter? Fear Monger
This Fear Monger is what I call the Inner Critic. Some call it a Saboteur, The Committee in the Head, or The Gremlin, it goes by many names.
Did you know the source of this inner dialogue, this internal mind chatter? It’s located in a particular spot in our brains. I’ll show you a quick model of our wonderful brain.
Make your hand into a fist with your thumb tucked inside. Really try it.
You now have a model of your brain. Right in the middle where your thumb is, represents the AMYGDALA, the fear center. The amygdala is part of our primitive brain, our reptilian brain. Its job is to warn us of imminent danger. It enabled us to survive as a species. Today it has the same job, to warn us of danger, whether the danger is real or imagined.
This tendency to spot possible danger, to see the the negative first, is part of our DNA. It is “negativity bias”. It is there to protect us, keep us alert.
That is why our minds still look for something that doesn’t look quite right. It’s why we can become fixed on the negative. And this is normal.
This negativity bias activates the Fear Monger or our Inner Critic. It shows up as we begin learning language. Yup, that soon.
Here’s a funny story about my granddaughter when she was a year old and learning to walk.
We had cats and kept the cats’ dry food at the far end of the kitchen. She heard “don’t touch that, it’s for the cat not you”, many times.
I remember one day especially well when she was playing in the dining room. She turned to her mom, then to me and shook her finger. She looked at us with a scowl. We watched as she teetered off to the far end of the kitchen. She bent down, picked up a morsel of cat food and turned right around and looked at us, smiling! We couldn’t hear it out loud but my granddaughter was listening to her inner critics!
We store away our mothers’ warnings. We store away our siblings cruel teasing. We store away the bully’s put downs, or teachers harsh corrections. These can resurface as the voice within, that warns us. These can start a chain reaction, of thoughts that create SELF DOUBT. And Self Doubt is a killer.
It’s A killer of creativity, confidence curiosity and self compassion.
So here I am a coach, encouraging others to believe in themselves. And I am filled with self doubt myself.
I get it.
I get that feeling of “not quite ready enough”, not feeling “good enough”.
This doubt, held me back from enjoying what I was good at. It kept me on the edge of anxiety, playing it safe, waiting for the “right” time. Waiting for the “perfect” time, feeling “not quite ready enough”, or “good enough”.
While I was a teacher, I helped students celebrate their successes, even when they didn’t believe in them. Yet I couldn’t own my own successes.
Now I am aware of that inner chatter. I have developed ways to get centered, clear, calm and move forward. It took awareness.
You can raise your awareness.
You can change the negative tapes of YOUR INNER CRITIC. You CAN change your self talk from doubtful to confident. You CAN change it from fearful to courageous, from cynical to kind. Self kindness and awareness reduces the sting of the Fear Monger. It will shrink, and fade.
Really.
In the next post I will share how to become aware your calmer, grounded, wiser part.
Awareness is a powerful thing.