You cannot bully yourself into wholeness. You cannot shame yourself into freedom or joy. You CAN learn to befriend your whole messy and beautiful self – including your mean inner critic.
My Inner Critic was not just mean but vicious. It bullied me, held me back, told me I was never ever good enough. No matter how hard I worked I could never measure up or keep up – the bar just kept being raised. My Critic pointed out all my flaws and keep me mired in chronic anxiety. I wanted to write but kept silent. I longed for freedom but kept picking up another set of chains.
To keep my Critic at bay I burned the candle at both ends, trying to order my life and home with perfection. Perfectionism was the way I knew to try to feel safe in the world. But of course it didn’t work. People died, bad stuff happened, and I lived in constant fear of the next bad thing around the bend.
But one day, 18 years ago, I came up to one of my life’s significant choice points. I was no longer willing to live like this. For my children’s sake especially, and also for mine, I pivoted to face Fear and my Inner Critic head-on, planted my feet, and declared that I was going to walk in freedom! I was going to be the boss of my life from now on.
Slow and steady, one small stubborn choice after another, my life began to change. I developed new practices and muscle memory, uprooted old harmful ways of thinking and replaced them with truth. I picked myself up more and more quickly if I stumbled or fell, and I built a kind and respectful friendship with myself. With time and consistent hard work, my Inner Critic became a friend (or I forged a friendly relationship with it).
HOW TO Befriend your inner critic and walk in greater freedom
My workshops are open to everyone in my community; they’re relaxed, values-packed, take place via Zoom, and are a great way to dip your toe into working with me.
buy the WORKSHOP IF…
- You are tired of feeling bad, wrong, or broken all the time! Your inner critic is harming you (causing shame, low self-esteem, imposter syndrome, holding you back in your work, creativity, and relationships, or causing you to struggle hard with anxiety and depression).
- You are an Enneagram One and/or you have a history with perfectionism and/or fear and want help quieting their voice and building new patterns that will help you (re)claim greater freedom, health, and joy.
- You’re a highly sensitive soul, a slow-mover, or you simply opt out of hustle-culture. You’re seeking a soul-honouring way of being in your body and life. Yet you often feel judged (internally and/or externally) for not jumping through all the hoops or measuring up to what dominant culture says you “should” be doing/accomplishing. You could use some encouragement from someone walking their talk about how to quiet all the noise and forge your own ‘right-sized’ path.
- You want to leave a legacy of wholeness for your children or disrupt unhealthy intergenerational patterns in your family.
befriend your inner critic workshop replay $45 USD
After payment you will receive log in details to access the workshop replay and notes. Immediately following payment, you’ll be emailed a PDF with login details. If you don’t see it, check junk, spam, promotions folders. I also recommend that you mark our email as a safe sender.
*There are no refunds offered on digital products. Need help – send me an email. Put “Inner Critic Workshop” in your subject line.
What was most helpful to me was listening to my inner critique and learning she may not be correct. That if I do this process, she may become quieter. That would be amazing!
CS
I like that you start with recognizing our worth and value as a human is at the core of our being. You refer back to ideas we have been working on these past few months (finding our core values, MSB intentions; making new habits and rhythms; working on our self-regulation strategies; reframing our stories; building pause in our lives). It helps me to refer back to these past modules, look at some of the activities and articles. It really helps cement these ideas in my head. You said something like this toward the end: If you keep yourself small and hidden, you won’t risk rejection and pain. That thought really smacked me in the head!
KR
Krista, thanks for this workshop! I’ve already used the steps to evaluate a difficult situation and insert some breathing space before I react.
HW
Krista,
I enjoyed your very informative workshop, and look forward to reviewing all of the materials you have provided for us. My favorite part of anything you do is that you share from your personal experiences, and it’s not all dry info. Your biggest asset (IMHO), is the “street cred”, you bring to each and every presentation of your written or spoken work, ie, you have had to do the work, and walk the walk. Oh my goodness, what weight that gives your words!
Thanks for being so very giving of yourself, and your experiences. You are a gift❤️-FE
This was very helpful, I just typed up my notes and will dig into all the material you sent us. Some of what you said I have heard of but I liked what you said about self-care only touching the surface layer. Such a huge self-care industry and it doesn’t really address the deeper level issues we all have. Just glosses over it like its a quick fix. Even so I do love a good massage, aroma therapy, and meditation.
Thank you for doing this work and helping us dig out our root stories.
MR
