You can’t stop the inner critic—that voice will keep telling you you’re not doing enough, not trying hard enough, not good enough. But you can change how you respond to it. Joe offers a practical experiment: write down 20 different ways to respond to your inner critic, then rotate through them every few days.
Options include: “That’s pretty bad management style.” “I see how scared you are.” “Shut up.” “Yes, sir. I’ll get right on that.” The key is that none of these is the “right” response. The experiment itself is the practice—discovering what it’s like to relate to the critic differently.
“You don’t really get to change the critic as much as you get to change the way that you relate to the critic.”
This must be framed as experimentation, not improvement. The moment it becomes a tool to get better, it stops working—it becomes another form of the critic’s control. You’re not trying to get anywhere. You’re just noticing what happens.
Related Concepts
- Welcome the inner critic
- The inner critic is not your voice
- Resisting the inner critic strengthens it
- Experiments separate identity from behavior
- Respond differently to the inner critic as a practice
- Play with the inner critic rather than fighting it
- Saying ‘ouch’ to the inner critic creates distance from it