WEEKLY VLOG #8:
3 REASONS WHY I AM MY WORST CRITIC
Transcript
Hello and welcome! Dear wonderful people!
I am Totally Zen Tadeja from Andromeda Yoga Atelier. Every Thursday I am going to answer a real-time question we might all be struggling with considering yoga, mental health, and well-being. If you have a question post it in the comments down below.
The vlog is specially dedicated to people who are:
- Tired
- Tired of being tired and
- Tired of explaining how tired they are to everyone else.
You can substitute the word tired with exhausted, feeling blue, stuck, busy… Whatever pops in your head. USE THAT!
The past year has been hard for most people. I have sent over 160 job applications and gotten less than a dozen job interviews. Sometimes I would still cry after a rejection because rejections just feel awful. It’s because rejection makes me feel like I am not good enough or that I am a failure. But this is not necessarily true…
So… today’s question is:
Why I am my worst critic?
Here are my three reasons why:
- overworking to avoid critique,
-
by criticizing myself first others might criticize me less,
-
internalizing critique desensitizes me to critique in general.
1. Overworking to avoid critique
Everyone wants to feel included and no one wants to be left out. When you get left out of a group it feels like a punch in the gut. Similarly, being critiqued can be very painful especially when people are making fun of something you cannot change like the hair or the nose you were born with, or even the color of your skin. A person who is adamant about loving and accepting themselves would not even give a moment of thought to such opinions. But if you were growing up in an unstable environment that is controlling, less affectionate, or abusive, it might have left you lacking self-love and self-acceptance entirely. Instead, your worth may come from other sources like achievements. I used to think if I did extraordinary well in school my parents will actually notice me and stop criticizing me so much. Well, needless to say, the strategy did not work because no matter what I do I cannot change how others feel about themselves or about me. In the end, this kind of thinking is just wishful thinking. The unsolicited critique will still happen no matter how much hard work you put into something. So if the feedback helps you grow and improve consider it. If the feedback is not really a solution to a problem it is just another opinion and that’s IT.
2. By criticizing myself first others might criticize me less
When I point out my flaws I take away the chance for other people to point them out. I have repeated the same mean negative words to myself so often that I have desensitized myself to them. In reality, though, that is just such a bad idea because you are repeating negative thoughts about yourself all the time. You are practically manifesting bad karma and you might be sabotaging yourself by doing it. Moreover, how do you even know what is going to come out of another person’s mouth anyhow! What if they were about to say something really positive? A lot of times people tell me they are not enough of this or that to do yoga. I am a yoga teacher and I think everyone can do yoga. So sometimes getting to yourself before others get to you is not necessary at all! Coming from this perspective criticizing yourself seems like an awful amount of energy just going out of the window.
3. Internalizing critique desensitizes me to critique in general
If you get an anesthetic and then hit yourself on your head with a hammer over and over again you might feel nothing anymore, but guess what, you also are going to crack your skull open. What if instead of banging yourself over the head with a hammer you would just get off the anesthetic and throw away the hammer? Because failure and rejection are inevitable in life. They will happen at some point or another to 99,99% of the people. But should one, two, or a dozen events really define me who I am as a person and if I am lovable? Heck no!!! Because if that was accurate, none of us would ever be worth any love or acceptance! And that is simply impossible. So why not just focus on the people and situations that are loving and accepting like this little yoga group I have here?
To summarize, you cannot influence the actions of others by working harder, being smarter or more kind. You can only influence yourself by loving and accepting yourself the way you are. We are all just doing the best we can. More negativity towards yourself will only make you feel worse about yourself or numb out your feelings completely. Most importantly, it will not prevent rejection or failure. Nothing will prevent rejection and failure, but YOU have the option to choose if that is really what is going to define you in life. Or maybe you can choose to be a person who gets up after every fall and keeps going is what defines you instead. Trying and failing might just lead to trying and succeeding in the end!
With that thought I bow the head to the heart; may the wisdom of the body and the wisdom of the mind unite together to support our collective healing and evolution.
