An imaginative method to tame self-critical thoughts

‘I feel like my head is immersed in a cloud, a cloud of thoughts. When it starts, I can no longer see clearly, everything becomes blurry, threatening and scary. I doubt myself with anything… Even having a simple conversation becomes difficult, I feel like I am being observed. Like someone is constantly watching me, and picking on everything I do or say... the voices are always there, and I cannot stop them from talking.’

If this description sounds familiar, you experience painful self-critical thoughts and you feel this is holding you back in your life or career, then maybe this article is for you. It may be helpful to understand your self-critical thoughts better, and hopefully provide some useful suggestions on how to manage them.  

In this article, I provide a view of self-critical thoughts according to psychosynthesis theory, a holistic therapeutic approach helping the individual deal with dilemmas, conflicts and patterns of behaviours which inhibit or prevent living life in meaningful and fulfilling ways. I also suggest some steps to bring self-critical thoughts under control. 

What are self-critical thoughts? A bit of theory

1. Characteristics 

I came across many different presentations throughout the years, including my personal one. Everyone is different and experiences thoughts and feelings in a unique way, expressing them with unique images and metaphors. However, I find there are some basic ingredients of the experience of self-critical thoughts:

• they are generally experienced as voices or images (e.g. a cloud, a grey fog)
• they express negative views about ourselves and what we are doing, or want to do
• they trigger intense anxiety
• they are difficult to control or they cannot be controlled at all
• they may be constant or be triggered only in certain situations
• they cause emotional pain and hold us back in social situations including professional settings
• we may be drawn to use substances to calm them down

To understand what self-critical thoughts are, we need to look at the past, very often at childhood. Many of us developed what in psychosynthesis is called a critical subpersonality. Let me first explain what a subpersonality is. 

2. Subpersonalities 

A subpersonality is a combination of thoughts, traits, habits, and other psychological elements. You can think of subpersonalities as parts of your personality or different people within us. Both views are valid, but the second is more useful, as you will see later.

Everyone has a unique set of subpersonalities that have developed through life and fulfil different purposes. Some are prevalent in a person’s life, while others are more hidden or have been suppressed. For example, one might have a prominent ‘carer’ subpersonality, which shows when someone around her needs support, may it be a child, a friend, a colleague, or a patient.

This ‘carer’ subpersonality may have developed in early life when she had to look after her younger siblings. It has then become a prevalent part of her personality, which makes her an attentive and sensitive friend, colleague, mother or partner. In some cases, this subpersonality may become too dominant which causes difficulties. For example, she may consistently put others’ needs first and neglect hers. 

Another example may be someone who has a strong ‘achiever’ subpersonality, developed at a young age to respond to the demands of her family and social context. This strong ‘achiever’ within her has pushed her to work hard to meet her life objectives. It may have served her well in her career but may have caused stress and burnout, and may have brought her to focus less on enjoyment of life and friendships. 

As we can see in the examples, our subpersonalities always have a bright side and a shadow. The challenge is to find a balance where every subpersonality is integrated in the personality and can bring a positive contribution to the person’s life, without overtaking the entire personality and causing issues. 

3. The critical subpersonality 

A critical subpersonality is the part of the personality responsible for self-critical thoughts. It generally develops at a young age as a result of the environment we were brought up in, and how people around us responded and communicated. It is not uncommon for children to be very much encouraged to do things in a particular way and to be humiliated if they behave differently, or if they behave too freely and show too much of themselves. These responses may come from family, school, or other social settings the young person is involved in. 

These conditions favour the development of a critical subpersonality. This ‘critic’ within us gets activated anytime we behave in ways that do not conform to the environment and therefore can put us at risk. This fulfils the need to be safe in our environment. It is a form of adaptation whose function is to keep us safe and accepted, which is of primary importance to the child and the young person. 

However, if the ‘critic’ is too prominent, it may cause disturbances later in life and negatively impact our development by not allowing our personality to come out in social settings, and causing significant emotional pain. 

How to tame the ‘critic’ 

1. Personify 

Firstly, it is important to personify the critical subpersonality. This means to look at the critical subpersonality as a person in itself and to refer to it as someone else. We should make an effort to change our inner narrative to refer to the ‘critic’ in the third person. For example, when we have the thought ‘I am not good enough’, we should stop a moment and tell ourselves ‘There she is … telling me I am not good enough’. The advantage of this way of thinking is to create a space between us and the ‘critic’. You may also give her a name of choice, or simply call her the ‘critic’. 

2 Get to know the ‘critic’ 

You may imagine the ‘critic’. What does she look like? How is she dressed? What is her facial expression? What about her posture? Notice if she reminds you of a person in your present, or in your past. It is useful to spend some time imagining her, maybe with eyes closed. It is also useful to create a drawing of her, however you can. If you cannot draw a picture, then you may draw a symbol for her. 

While imagining or drawing her, it is important to notice the feelings that come up for you. What emotions arise when imagining the critic? How does your body feel? Are there any tensions in parts of your body? Take some written notes of these feelings and sensations.

By doing all of this, not only we are getting to know this subpersonality which will help us gain more control over it, but we are also training our mind to keep a distance between ourselves and the self-critical thoughts. In other words, we are creating a character in the mind to contain the critical thoughts as a separate entity from us. To separate the self-critical thoughts from our sense of I is essential to control them. 

3. The history of the ‘critic’

Now that we got to know the ‘critic’ and we developed an understanding of what happens to us when she gets activated, it is time to look at the past. To gain some control over the ‘critic’ we need to know more about her past history and start a dialogue with her. 

It is a matter of reflecting on where in your past this subpersonality originated. Look at events in your life that contributed to the development of this critical trait of your personality. It is very useful to summarise these reflections with written notes, maybe in the form of a story of the ‘critic’ describing events of your life where the ‘critic’ was fostered and reinforced. These could be episodes of your childhood or that happened later in life. 

While reflecting on the history of the ‘critic’, it is useful to ask yourself how the ‘critic’ served you in your life. How did she keep you safe when you were younger? How does she protect you in your present life? Take notes on these aspects too. 

4. In dialogue with the ‘critic’

Now that you have reflected on the history of the ‘critic’ and her role in your past and present life, it is time to enter into a dialogue with her. You may ask the ‘critic’ what she needs. Maybe she wants to feel reassured, she needs to feel that everything is fine now. You may imagine entering into a dialogue with her, telling her reassuring words. 

By starting an internal dialogue with the ‘critic’, you are allowing her in your life. Rather than fearing her and keeping her aside, you are welcoming her, acknowledging the positive role she had and still has in your life. The only way to gain control over a part of ourselves is to accept and allow it. If we instead repress it or deny it, it will control us.   

In moments when self-critical thoughts are triggered, you may bring the ‘critic’ subpersonality’s image to mind. If possible, you may find a quiet place to close your eyes and imagine her. Start a dialogue with her, and talk to her, tell her what she needs to hear in order to calm down. 

Ending reflections

We are relational and imaginal creatures. In order to keep the different parts of ourselves under control, we have to establish a relationship with them, we can do this with imagination. If approaching the issue of self-critical thoughts rationally by looking for a solution with thinking is likely not to bring us anywhere, creating mental images for the parts of our personality that are challenging is a useful way to enter into a dialogue with them and this way keep them under control.