Give space to your thoughts, clear the noise in your head, chit-chat with your inner critic, decide and move on.~ Cristina Imre

No matter how often we preach to practice self-love, we still fall victim to negative self-talk, our inner critic. It’s easy to believe that being hard on ourselves is part of our DNA. That no matter how hard we try, we’ll forever be locked in chains of self-doubt.

And while some would argue that these feelings are necessary for survival, I truly believe that too much of it simply isn’t good for us. Our insecurities paralyze us, keep us from advancing, and make living life pretty challenging.

That is why today, I’ll give you three helpful tips to quiet your inner critic. These tips will teach you to practice grace, move you into action, and show you how to be your own best friend, so you can finally live your life with confidence and without reservations.

3 Helpful Tips to Quiet Your Inner Critic

1. Give Your Inner Critic a Name.

Today, within my first hour of waking, these thoughts ran through my head:

• I’m not cut out for the entrepreneur life.
• I woke up so late today, what a lazy slob.
• Quarantine got the best of me.

Awful, right?

When you feed yourself so much criticism, two things happen:

1. You take that criticism to heart.
2. You feel guilty for hating on yourself.

This cycle feeds on itself, which is why it’s SO important to stop yourself at the first signs of it.

When you lend your inner critic a name, you give yourself an “out” from the inevitable guilt that comes with criticizing yourself. Not only that, but naming your inner critic reminds you that those self-destructive words are coming out of someone else’s mouth. Suddenly, it’s no longer “self” talk – someone is talking badly to you.

To prove my point, let’s call my inner critic Jennifer (random name, I promise!) and let’s revisit my early morning thoughts this way:

• Jennifer said, “You’re not cut out for the entrepreneur life.”
• Jennifer said, “You woke up so late today, what a lazy slob.”
• Jennifer took a glance at you and said, “Quarantine got the best of you.”

How did reading these statements make you feel? It made me feel like kicking Jennifer’s ass, for starters. And most importantly, it made me want to give the girl she was bullying, ME, a hug, and some tea.

By doing this exercise, you’ll learn that your inner critic doesn’t have your best interests at heart. Your inner critic is why you believe you’re not good enough, which is exactly why you should ignore her. You’ll learn to be kinder to yourself, and you’ll have a better grip on reality and the good that already rests in it.

2. Do Something You’ve Been Putting Off.

Before you drop everything to binge on Season 3 of Selling Sunset (yes, I’ve been putting it off, too), let me be clear: you have to do something that requires some effort.

What that means is, it’s not the time to take that indulgent bath you’ve been putting off. But, it is time to fold the laundry you washed three days ago that’s staring you down from your living room sofa. And yes, it is time to go on that run that yesterday, you said you would do tomorrow.

When you put something off, especially something you know you could get done right away, it slowly eats at your self-esteem. And the longer you put off the task, the more daunting it seems, and the more afraid you are to tackle it.

Here’s the kicker: Crossing something off your to-do list is a quick and easy way to redefine yourself.

So, the next time you catch yourself talking smack, do the thing. You’ll know what that is. (For me, at this moment, it’s getting a car wash.) Doing this will get you out of your head and into the world.

It will increase your productivity, and you’ll come out on the other side with proof to shove in your inner critic’s face to show she was wrong about you.

3. Prepare Content for Your Darkest Moment.

Think back to the last few times you were bringing yourself down. What do you tend to focus on? Is it your weight? Your skin? Your finances? Loneliness?

Identify common themes, and then start collecting content you think would stop your inner critic in those moments.

If you’re like me and tend to be body-image obsessed after scrolling on Instagram for too long:

• Create an Instagram collection.
• To it, save Instagram posts related to body positivity. My collection has stuff ranging from Health at Every Size to pictures of women with my body type who are rocking it.
• Refer back to it when you need a body-image pick-me-up.

You can do this for anything, and it works like a charm! If you’re starting your own business, you might be deep in the trenches, with no sight of light at the end of the tunnel. Why not create a Pinterest board, and to it, pin blogs, articles, and inspirational quotes to help you get through those times when you question your decision in becoming an entrepreneur?

The whole point is to create a resource you can turn to that will take you out of a rut and back into making moves. When you do this, you’re giving your future self the BFF she needs. You’re employing a system to take you out of a dark place and bring you back to your highest self – precisely where you belong 24/7/365.

All this is to say…

Negative self-talk is a waste of time. It’s a bad habit that we are better off without. We need to be our biggest advocates and learn to rely on ourselves for our peace and happiness. Remember, no one else is required to give that to us.

I hope you put these tips to good use, so you can finally say, “Inner critic – that’s enough out of you.”

**What about you? How do you deal with negative self talk? How do you quiet the inner critic? You can share your comment below 🙂

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