Within each of us are two internal ‘voices’. Some refer to them as Ego and Spirit, Fear and Love, or, as I do, Inner Wisdom and the Inner Critic. These voices and energies shape our thoughts, beliefs, feelings and ultimately our action or inaction.
Learning to decipher the two and consciously choose which voice to nurture and follow is key to cocreating a life of our desires. Often, we allow our Inner Critic, which may at times be the loudest, to guide our lives and our choices—instead of learning to listen to and trust our inner wisdom. It’s time to flip the script. Let’s start by distinguish the difference between the two.
The Voice of Your Inner Wisdom
The voice of your Inner Wisdom is kind, loving and supportive. It is love! It nourishes you with thoughts and visions filled with possibility, optimism and hope. You feel expansive, unlimited and more than capable to carry out your dreams. The emotions and thoughts your inner wisdom presents resonate at a much higher energetic frequency, feel good, and represent your dreams, aspirations, and your true authentic self.
When you are aligned with your Inner Wisdom you are connected to your Source (God, Universe, or Spirit) and feel as if you’re being led toward your highest good. We all possess inner wisdom, even in those times we feel disconnected from it.
The Voice of Your Inner Critic
The energy underlying all of the Inner Critics messages is fear. These untruths form from conditioned responses based on our life experiences, self-judgments, fears, and evolution’s fight or flight responses hard coded in our reptilian brain. Its altruistic design is to whisper ideas or messages that it thinks will keep us safe and instead keeps us comfortably stuck where we are.
You can generally tell when the Inner Critic is running the show, because the thoughts generally lead to feelings of not being enough, self-doubt, self-judgment, worry, and what-if spiral thinking.
The voice of the Inner Critic can manifest in many ways including defensiveness, procrastination, judgement of others, or guilt. It can often lead to feeling we need to hold on tight to life and situations and a deep need to control.
Nurturing the Voice You Wish to Co-Create With
When you nurture and strengthen your relationship with your Inner Wisdom, and work to soothe the mind chatter of the Inner Critic you will discover a path to inner peace, joy, and fulfillment. When we create practices, like the one below to soothe our Inner Critic, we can uncover our false beliefs, stories, and patterns. From that place of awareness and alignment, we can choose to take inspired actions on new thoughts, patterns, and beliefs.
You have the power to choose which voice you listen to. Isn’t that empowering?
Here are 7 Powerful Ways to Strengthen Your Inner Wisdom.
These techniques work because they take your focus away from your mind chatter, soothe your soul, and make space for you to drop into your heart so that you may further strengthen your connection to inner wisdom.
- Allow Creative Play: Think about creating art, music, writing/journaling, coloring, reading, painting, hobbies, sound bowls, tuning forks, learning something new, and other types of relaxing mindful play that lights you up. If you’ve forgotten how to play, this is an invitation to allow your inner child to lead the way.
- Bask in the Stillness: Try deep breathing, visualization, meditation in any form, mantras, affirmations, a quiet space, and living in the present moment often. Even the simplicity of being fully present while you’re enjoying your morning tea is a form of stillness and meditation. Be fully in the stillness of the moment; it helps you to hear your soul’s wisdom.”
- Make Mindful Movement: Your sacred body craves and is designed to move. Walking, flowing, dancing, singing, stretching, yoga, energy work, any kind of movement will do. Whatever inspires you to move your body—follow that nudge—it’s your Inner Wisdom leading the way.
- Immerse Into Nature: Enjoy hikes, water, critters, bird watching, tree hugging, forest baths, and being surrounded by abundance, oh my! Tap into the energy of nature anytime you need grounding, inspiration or to be reminded of the bounty of the world.
- Create Sacred Rituals: There are many ways to incorporate sacred rituals into your life. It’s the energy and intention that you bring to the task at hand that creates a ritual. Create a ritual around a relaxing evening bath by lighting a candle and adding essential oils. Even blessing your food and drink with a heartfelt thank you is another way to nourish yourself.
- Practice Daily Gratitude: We’re often so busy looking at what’s missing in our lives that we don’t take the time to count our blessings—large and small. Adding in a daily practice of giving gratitude for the little blessings is one of the greatest mindset and energy shifters there is.
- Call on Divine Source for Guidance: You are always Divinely supported. Instead of pushing, and forcing your way through life, try surrendering to your Source (God, Divine, Goddess, Universe, etc), and asking for support. When you feel stuck or need clarity, ask “what is my next best step?” and wait for an answer to come into your awareness.
A reminder that the voice you nurture is the voice you will cocreate your life with. So, choose wisely.
A 4-Step Process to Soothe the Chatter of Your Inner Critic.
There will be times that it seems as if our Inner Critic is taking a temper tantrum and trying to keep you stuck in fear, indecision and self-doubt. Anytime that occurs—and it will—be prepared by turning to this powerful 4-step process that I use myself and with my private clients.
Step 1: Become Aware of Your Inner Chatter.
The most important step is to become aware of WHEN the Inner Critic is running the show. From this place of awareness, you have the power to soothe ‘her’ and invite your Inner Wisdom to the conversation. At times your inner critic, will keep shouting, promoting, whining, and barking these old beliefs at you in an attempt to not let in the new and more empowering thoughts.
Without judgement, just witness the conversation. Now that you are fully present and aware that your Inner Critic is acting out, move to the next step.
Step 2: Release the Untruths.
Now that you have identified that the Inner Critic is acting out, I invite you to try the following practice–one of my favorites.
Close your eyes and visualize a whiteboard in front of you. Now envision all the negative chatter and beliefs your Inner Critic is spewing on the dry erase board and visualize it in your own handwriting. Now choose one of the thoughts from the board. Focus on this thought, and express gratitude that it has helped you feel safe in the past in some way. Thank your Inner Critic for keeping you safe for now and let it know that you’ve got it from here. Then, in your mind’s eye, watch the statement be erased from the dry erase board.
This focused practice serves two purposes. It allows your Inner Critic to be heard which quiets the voice, and it empowers you to own your worth and truth.
Step 3: Rescript a Powerful New Truth.
Rescripting outdated limiting beliefs is a powerful way to rewire your neural pathways. Your limiting thoughts are not your sacred truth. Each time you catch a limiting thought, as you did in Step 2 above, it’s important to rescript them, through journaling, affirmations and more. As an example, if you’re limiting thought is “I am not capable of making this change in my life.”, a sample rescript could be “I am capable of taking one small step at a time.” What’s important in this practice is consistency, and I’ve found journaling the rescripted affirmations daily very helpful.
Step 4: Create a Consistent Practice
The more consistently you practice these steps, you’ll notice your Inner Critic becomes quieter and you will feel more empowered in your day-to-day life. It’s been said that it takes 21 or more days for a belief to shift and for new neuropathways to be formed, so your consistency is important. Keep in mind, the old thought might arise on occasion, but you now know you have the power and awareness to simply acknowledge, thank it, and let it go, returning to the new truth of who you really are.
My friend, you are worthy of the love, joy, happiness and success that you desire and deserve. Your limiting thoughts are not the truth of who you are, and you do have the power to strengthen your connection to your Inner Wisdom and to soothe that self-defeating voice of your Inner Critic.
