March 30, 2023

#PositiveIntelligence #findingjoy #findingclarity #findingpurpose #coaching #mentalfitness

A new show on Hulu, "Up Here" is all about the voices in your head, although unlike in my life, those voices sing. Luckily (for my sanity) mine do not!

Have you ever wondered about what your inner judge is telling you and whether anything you hear from them, musical or not, is true?

Spoiler alert, if you are like 99.99% of humans, nothing you hear from your inner critical voices is true. Here is a tip. If you are hearing a negative voice in your head that is highly critical of you, is focused on your mistakes, embarrassing moments, or painful lessons of the past, or perhaps forecasting bad outcomes for your future.

On the other hand, you can certainly examine with calm discernment any results you want to improve for something to learn and grow from, that is a whole other thing and very beneficial. But that is not what wakes you up at night spewing poisonous thoughts and causing your heart to race, your stomach to drop, and your palms to sweat. That is the voice of your main inner critic or Judge.

Every month, I will have a new Positive Intelligence story for you, sometimes poignant, sometimes funny. All very human. I thought I'd start with my own.

The picture above is my own inner critic, in PQ language, my Judge. I call her Murgatroyd. Murgatroyd is like a bad roommate who never cleans up after herself and always eats the last slice of pizza. Ugh! But we all have a very personal and unique experience of our inner Judge. Mine is very dismissive and disgusted. Your mileage may vary. I have learned to identify Murgatroyd’s voice. She uses words like "never" "always" "should" and lots of insulting words like "idiot" "clumsy" "dumb", etc. Over time, I became an expert at recognizing her snarky tone. In PQ talk, we call this Saboteur Interception. When I hear her, I pause and take some deep breaths. I picture Murgatroyd up on her bench, and then when I exhale, I picture her being blown away by the strength of my breath. She is knocked off her chair, and goes flying like the Wicked Witch in the Wizard of Oz. And her voice is gone, poof, and there is peace. (At least until the next time that I catch her, but that is for another edition.)

One of the reasons this is so powerful is that Murgatroyd or your own judge, whatever you name them, they do not work alone. They summon accomplice saboteurs that are able to help disrupt your peace and joy, lesson your accomplishments and results, and even destroy your sleep. There are 9 accomplices you can read about (see Saboteurs | Positive Intelligence) and which ones bother you the most depends on how you were pre-wired at birth with unique strengths. And what you learned as a young child about how to succeed in the environment you found yourself in. The result of these saboteurs occupying your mind, is to trap you in cycles of negative emotion, creating unhappiness and wasted time. These saboteurs are habits of thinking that we all have developed. But we can learn to tame them.

My worst offending saboteur was the Hyper-Vigilant, causing me to stress out about all kinds of things that had not happened yet... but could happen, no matter how unlikely. I would picture bad things occurring to my loved ones or myself, day and night. I was on flight or fight hyperdrive. Not anymore, but believe me, this was not fun for me and others when the Hyper-Vigilant saboteur highjacked me. It caused me to panic about any risk or threat anywhere around me, my family, my workplace. Super-yuck!

But back to Murgatroyd, or enter the name of your judge here: what becomes possible for you if that inner negative voice was interrupted starting today? What greater impact would you achieve? How would your increased energy and resilience affect your family, your relationships? Your career? How much more could you enjoy your life?

For me, the peace, joy, relationship, mood and sleep benefits have been enormous. My PQ clients have each felt less stressed, more confident, and have better resilience and ability to tackle the challenges of life.

To learn more, take a free assessment: Assessments | Positive Intelligence. And write to me at: [email protected] for an appointment. I can help you understand your own unique picture and give you some tips and tricks for starting to deal with your own inner saboteurs. An introductory coaching session is obligation free, and I promise will be fun for us both.

Unlike listening to your inner judge berate you. Even if they sing.