My Beloved Monster And Me

What if you were completely on your own side, no matter what? What if you no longer criticized yourself, no longer attacked yourself, no longer judged yourself in the same way? What if you stopped imagining that other people were thinking negative things about you and you just felt relaxed in yourself? You knew that you were okay, knew that you were safe, knew that you were doing just fine. You were good enough. What would that bring to your life? How good would you feel? How confident would you be when you no longer criticize or attack yourself? You're going to learn exactly how to do that in today's episode.

Coming to you from the center for Social Confidence in Portland, Oregon. Welcome to Shrink for the shy guy helping men everywhere go from social anxiety to social domination with your host, Dr. Azeece.

Welcome today's episode of the show. Today we're going to be looking at My beloved monster and me. That's right, it's you and your inner critic. We talked about this before, earlier in the show, and it's a theme that comes up throughout episodes, but I thought I'd go even deeper. I've been making some great distinctions with clients. And as always with this show, I take the best stuff that I get with clients and I just spread it. I share it with you. So you're getting some tremendous value for free. And if you want to jump into the conversation or ask me questions, I'd love to answer them. Just go to shrinkforthshyguy.com and send me a message through the site. You can also call the studio hotline at 206-3383-176. One quick favor I'd love to ask in return for enjoying the show and any of the benefits you've got from it is if you got my book the Solution to Social Anxiety on Amazon or Kindle or audible through there, and you read it or listened to it and you liked it, please give it a review because the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach and the more I can mitigate any people out there who are haters who give it one star and don't say why. So what we want to do is build up that review base. So if you read it, if you listen to it and you liked it, by all means, please just do me a solid favor and go give it a review. And in return, my friend, I'm going to give you some incredibly powerful concepts today that are gonna help you become a lot more relaxed in yourself, a lot more free of criticism. And I called this show My beloved Monster and Me because it's a song by the artist or the group, the Eels. And I don't know if when he wrote the lyrics for this, he knew exactly what was going on, but his understanding of the inner critic is so spot on, so powerful, so directly accurate in the song, that that's why I called this show after that. And I'll have a link to the song below and the lyrics as well, so you can look at them. But if you've never heard of it, it was in Shrek, the original Shrek. But the first stanza goes like this. My beloved monster and me, we go everywhere together. Wearing a raincoat that has four sleeves gets us through all kinds of weather. So your monster is your critic, Right? My beloved critic and me, we go everywhere together. Isn't that so true? The critic is kind of always there, following us around. Can never really escape him. And here's where it gets even more powerful. She will always be the only thing that comes between me and the awful sting that comes from living in a world that's so damn mean. Now. Real uplifting, right? But this is exactly what's happening with the critic. And when you get this, when you understand this, you are gonna become so much more free from it because you're gonna be relating to it in an entirely different way. So I'm so excited. I have so much to share. I'm gonna action pack this episode full of stuff, and you are gonna get a tremendous value if you stick with me to the end of this episode. And I promise you, you're gonna see your. Your critic in an entirely different way. And it's gonna help you feel a lot more free in your life. So the first things first is we gotta know this inner critic thing, right? And I think you do by now. If you're not sure, check out one of my earlier episodes. I think it was maybe six or seven, way back, way in the beginning of the podcast that's all about you and your inner critic and gives you more information about it. But the first thing we have to do is be able to identify when it's active because many of us have lived with it for so long that we're not even aware that it's a critic happening. It's just, it feels like our own thoughts or we're not even aware of a critic saying anything in our own mind. We just feel that sinking feeling in our chest. But if you slow down and you listen, whenever you're feeling bad, you're feeling anxious, you're feeling scared, you're feeling inferior, you're feeling Ashamed. Slow down and say, what is the critic saying right now? Because if you're feeling one of those emotions, the critic is active, guaranteed. What is the critic saying right now? And just listen and try to identify it, because it will give you a clue as to what's going on. When you can hear. When it says, you're a loser, what's wrong with you? Those people think you're stupid. So the critic's gonna show up in a few different ways. He might use projection, which is saying, they think that you're stupid. They think they think that you're ugly. That guy thinks you're a loser. That woman thinks you're creepy. So the critic is using other people to make it seem like they're the ones criticizing you. But it's really the critic. It's just. It's doing something called projection. Another thing, a way your critic will show up is by showing you images of replaying the event and then commenting on it. Kind of like the. The football coach from hell who just keeps replaying the same fumble and saying, why did you do that? Oh, my God, that was terrible. Why? What kind of coach is that? Anyway, so that's what the critic might be doing, whatever it's doing, or it might just be straight up berating you. You suck. You're a loser. What's wrong with you? Whatever it's doing, you have to stop and say, whoa, whoa, whoa. There's the critic. That's step one. You gotta be able to identify it. There's the critic. And then what we often do is we have a way that we try to deal with the critic, Right? And the critic is also trying to get us to do stuff. So we gotta understand this whole process. And I'm gonna make it really simple for you. The first thing first is, what do you do when you notice your critic? What is your strategy to respond to your critic? For most people, the strategy is one of three things. One, they try to ignore it. Try to say, la, la, la, la, la, la. Don't say that to me. I'm gonna go, you know, twiddle on my phone or check Facebook again, or just try to go talk to those people and not pay attention to my critic. And that's one strategy. Another strategy is to try to fight back against what the critic says. Says, oh, you're a loser. You made a fool of yourself there. You could say that wasn't so bad. I mean. I mean, it wasn't. I didn't make a total fool of myself fighting back. And then the third strategy is to just sort of succumb to it. Oh, yeah, it's true. I'm a pathetic loser. That's right. You just kind of. You're beaten down. Those are the three strategies. Which ones do you do? What's sort of your default strategy? Do you try all three or do you stick to one? What do you do when the critic's active? Do you ignore it? Do you try to distract yourself and ignore it? Do you fight back? And sometimes fighting back can be kind of battling it with logic or reason. Sometimes fighting back can be telling it to, like, shut up, get away from me. I hate you. Right? You're just gonna get angry with your critic, or you might just succumb. You might just. Yeah, it's giving me the brutal truth, I tell ya. That's just how it is. So how do you respond? Think about that for a moment. We're gonna take a quick break, and when you get back, we're gonna talk about do these strategies work? What's effective? What's more effective than any one of these strategies? That's going to completely change the way you relate to your critic, which is going to completely change your confidence level, which is going to completely change your life. So stay tuned. We'll be back right after this. Quick question for you. Do you think that working with Dr. Aziz directly could help you accelerate your progress? After personally conquering his shyness, he's gone on to help thousands of others do the same. Starting in March of 2015, you now have a chance to work with him directly in a new total confidence group coaching program. Learn how to take charge of your life, generate confidence at will, and eliminate your fears of rejection and failure. Go to socialconfidencecenter.com coaching to find out more. So what strategy did you do? What strategy do you often choose when you deal with your critic? Well, what's gonna work better? First of all, do these strategies work? So when you try to ignore your critic, does that work? Well, sometimes it might. Now, if you're just ignoring him or her and, you know, playing a game on your phone, it maybe is gonna distract you a little bit. But my experience, the feelings are still there. You're just a little less aware of the. The discomfort, the negative thoughts in your mind. But you're still feeling kind of crummy. Or as soon as you're done playing the game, you feel kind of crummy. So straight up distraction often doesn't really work that well. Now, if you ignore your critic, your critic's saying, don't go talk to those people, you're going to make a fool of yourself. And you ignore your critic and you go talk to those people. Now that can be good, right? Because you're doing action, you're taking action, you're ignoring the criticism. But I found that there's like a. It's like pulling back a rubber band or something. It's only a matter of time until the critic slams you five times as hard. So while that might work in the short term, that's an effective strategy. Sometimes as your only strategy, I think it falls short and something more is needed. And I'm curious if that's your experience as well. The other strategy of just being browbeaten by it. Yeah, well, that doesn't work very well, right? It's just. You suck. Yeah, you're right, I suck. How do you feel? Oh, low self esteem, Depressed, dissatisfied with life. I mean, so that strategy is not so good. What about the other one? What about fighting your critic? Doesn't that seem to make sense? You know, tell that critic, begone. None shall pass away with you, you vile fiend. And we try to banish it, we try to execute it, we try to kill it. Well, has that worked? Can you kill your critic? Have you tried? What happens? Well, I've never met anyone who's been able to do that, to execute, slay their critic. But maybe you have. And if so, email me, tell me how you did it. It seems like a great strategy, but I've never seen that. What happens is we can't kill it. It's a part of us, it's a part of our mind, it's a part of our body. And it actually serves a very valuable function, even if we're not aware of it yet. In trying to argue with it though, with logic or reason, man, how does that work? Not very well. It'll just shift. It is relentless. It uses false arguments, you know, circular reasoning shifts to different topics. It's the debater from hell, doesn't follow any of the rules, doesn't follow any logic. And we'll just always use the trump card, which is emotional reasoning. This comes from cognitive therapy. But emotional reasoning is, you know, you're a loser. Well, why am I a loser? Because you feel like a loser. So you're a loser. And that's emotional reasoning. Because you feel a certain way, it must be true. I feel like those people are not going to like me, so therefore those people are not going to like me. And your critic loves that stuff. And so it's, you can't debate you can't win in a debate. So what do you do? What do you do? Well, in order to know how to effectively relate to your critic, if you can't kill him, you can't debate them, you can't just let him run the show, and you can't ignore him for long. First you got to know, what is the critic doing? Why is he here? What is his function? What is his purpose? And if you ask yourself that question, if you actually ask the critic that question, you get some interesting results. I do this, it's called Parts Work or Voice Dialogues is one of the therapies by. I think Hal Stone is his name, and his wife, I forget her name, something Stone. Anyway, they really pioneered this stuff, and it involves talking to this critic in yourself. And I actually have a section of that in my book, the Solution to Social Anxiety. But when you do that, what you find is that the critic is actually scared, is terrified of feeling pain, emotional pain. Doesn't want you to get rejected, doesn't want you to get criticized, doesn't want you to get. No. Doesn't want you to be embarrassed. It doesn't want you to be humiliated. It does not want you to feel emotional pain. And that's where that line from my beloved monster in me is so fitting. She will always be the only thing that comes between me and the awful sting that comes from living in a world that's so damn mean. So your critic has got this idea. It says, you know what? I remember every time we were hurt. I remember every time we were humiliated. We were embarrassed, we were rejected, we were criticized. The world's a mean place. Remember that? What happened in third grade and sixth grade and when we were two years old, when we were four years old, Stuff you consciously remember, sometimes you unconsciously remember it with your critic, but it's all in there. The critic says, hey, you know what? The world's a mean place and we gotta defend ourselves. I gotta come between you and the world, and I'm gonna protect you. And the way I'm gonna do that is I'm gonna attack you first. I'm going to criticize you first. I'm going to make sure that you stay internal, you stay small. You don't go vulnerably putting yourself out there, like, free and open in the world because you're going to get shot. And it's better to just be safe and be small and be with me and not get hurt out there. You're going to get hurt out there. So your critic. What's he doing? He's trying to what you. He's trying to protect you. That's right. He's trying to protect you from the outside world. Because the outside world is so damn mean from his perspective. And you know, he might seem like a raging angry beast, but he's just a scared kid. He's just that six year old kid that was made fun of on the playground. And it hurt so bad that in that moment the critic said, you know what? We're never going to feel this again. And that determination, that grit, he's going to do whatever it takes, even if it involves destroying you. We must protect from that outside pain. Again, that's the critic's job. And he's got all kinds of ways that he thinks that you need to be in the world to protect you from that pain. All kinds of strategies. In fact, we're take a quick break and we jump back in. We're going to see what are the main things he expects you to do to avoid the pain. And most importantly, how do you deal with him? How do you relate with him? With a strategy that actually puts him at ease and helps you freely move towards what you really want in this life with confidence. So stay tuned, we'll get back to that right after this.

Have you ever been stuck in limbo? You know that awkward situation where there are several groups of people talking around you and you aren't part of any of them. You want to jump in but you're not sure how to do it or what to say, so you slink into the corner, grab a drink at the bar and pretend to look busy on your cell phone. Tired of this less than optimal strategy? Get yourself a copy of the confidence code today and discover how to dominate in any group situation. Casually join into existing groups and even enjoy being the center of attention. Go to YourConfidenceCode.com now to get started.

Welcome back. So what does the critic want you to do? Right, he wants you to avoid that pain. But how does he think you should avoid the pain? Well, he's got several strategies. One is be nice. Be good. Be a good, nice person. Please other people, give them what they want and we won't experience that pain. He also says you gotta follow all the rules. Don't break any rules. If you follow all the rules, then everyone's gonna like you. No one can be upset with you if you follow all the rules. You gotta comply with what other people want. You also gotta make sure that you do it right. You don't make any mistakes. Because if you make mistakes. You could. Someone could yell at you. You could be ridiculed. You could be fired. You could be challenged. You could be embarrassed or humiliated. You also got to do it perfectly. Do it perfectly and nothing bad will happen. Because how can anyone criticize perfection? And by the way, be the best. Be number one. Because if you're number one, then of course no one's going to reject you and you're not going to feel any pain. Everyone's going to like you. That'll feel good. So that is a series of the critics strategies. Be nice. Be good. Follow the rules. Comply. Do it right. Do it perfectly. Be the best. Oof. Sound a little like a tall order, A little exhausting. Also, what does this sound like? What age does this sound like? Be good. Follow the rules. Do it right. What age does that sound like? That's right. Sounds like a kid, doesn't it? And that's exactly where this critic is formulated. It starts when we're really young. It can be built on if you have some painful experiences as you get older. Middle school, high school, even in your early jobs, anytime in your life, right? But especially when you're a kid, that's when the foundation is laid. And so when we're relating with this critic, that gives us a clue, because remember, I promised you that we're going to find a better strategy than any of the ones that we talked about before, a better strategy of relating with your critic. And here's what it is. You have to realize that your critic is just a scared kid. And that's why I love the song it's my beloved monster in me, not my terrible, shitty critic monster that I hate. My beloved monster in me. And that's what that critic needs from you, to be loved, to be treated with kindness. So when the critic acts up, he's going to show up in the form of, you suck. What's wrong with you? People think this about you. And what you're going to want to do is first say, ah, that's the critic. And then you're going to know, okay, he's scared. Always, always, always. Even if he looks angry, the critic is scared. So you're gonna say, okay, whoa, whoa, critic, you're active. So what are you scared of? And listen to what he's scared of. He might first start being tough. Like, I'm not scared of anything. I just think that you suck. Okay, all right. No, but really, it seems like you're worried about, you know, you're yelling at me because of that social interaction we were Just in at that party. And you're. It seems like you're worried about maybe how we came across or what are you afraid of? And you just keep being curious and asking and try to calm him down and find out, and he'll say, well, I'm scared of this. I'm worried about that. People are going to think this about you. And here's a huge magical distinction. This is what I do with people all day long, and I've seen what really works. Don't fight the critic. It says, I'm scared that people think that I made a. You know, I stumbled over my words, and they think that I don't know what I'm talking about, or they think I'm boring. Don't say, no. No. People don't think you're boring. People think you're great. Right. It seems like you're supporting yourself. It seems like you're encouraging yourself, but really you're invalidating the critic. You're telling him he's wrong for having those fears. And what you really want to do in this early stage of relating with your critic is just validate him. Oh, yeah, I know. Those moments were real awkward. I didn't like that either. I know. I felt a little uncomfortable not having anything to say there. Yeah, I didn't like that either. So you're relating to him. You're validating him. You're getting on his own side. That's the first step. And then the next step is to offer him some reassurance or safety. Say, hey, listen, I know it was real uncomfortable. And if those people are going to judge us, if they're really going to criticize us, don't worry, I can protect you now. I am assertive. If someone challenges us, I can respond. If someone. If someone is mean to us, we can distance ourselves from them. Don't worry, I'm here for you now. I'm going to take care of you. So this is a total shift because you know what's happening. Normally when the critic attacks us, it's this big scary thing, and we feel like we're like one inch tall, and we're like, oh, God, you're right. I'm a loser. And it's almost like it's the authority, it's the parent. We're the scared little kid who was the bad boy who didn't follow the rules, didn't do it right, didn't do it perfectly, made a mistake. But when you do this process of step one, identify the critic. Step two, ask him what he's Afraid of. And then validate him. And then step three, start to reassure him. Now, all of a sudden, when you're talking to the critic like that, hey, you're worried about that? Oh, okay. Yeah, I know. Me, too. That can be a little uncomfortable or scary sometimes. And, you know, I'll protect you, though. I'm gonna be here. I'm not going anywhere. So if that woman does say you're a pathetic loser, don't talk to me, worm. Hey, listen, we can do all kinds of things. We can actually even challenge her and say, listen, you can say no to me, but that's not cool to talk to me in that way. Or we can leave the situation, and afterwards, I'm going to remind you that you're okay and it doesn't matter what she thinks of us. And I'm going to take care of you. I'm going to protect you. Now, all of a sudden, what role are you in? You are the parent, aren't you? And you're parenting this scared little part of you. And no longer is it this big critic with all these fangs and this beast. It's really just this little kid that needs to be loved. And that's what you can do. And that's where this lyric in the song comes from. He says, my beloved monster is tough. If she wants, she will disrobe you. But if you lay her down for a kiss, her little heart, it could explode. It's the exact same thing with your critic, my friend. It seems tough. It could disrobe you, it could destroy you is what it feels like. But if you lay her down for a kiss, her little heart, it could explode. There's one last thing I want to share with you in this episode. It's very personal, but I feel like we've been talking for a long enough time now that we can trust each other. And that is. I had some periods in my life where this critic felt like it could destroy me. And I remember sitting at this little apartment. I was in this kitchen table, and I was just so low in my life at that time. And I remember sitting there and I was just so stuck, and nothing's ever going to change. And my critic was just tearing me apart. I hate you. You're pathetic. You're disgusting. And I honestly thought about, what's the point of living? I really considered what's ending it. Like, what's the point? I mean, I feel so bad right now, and I felt so bad, and nothing's going to change. And I was just so low. And that doesn't happen anymore in my mind. That doesn't exist in my brain and not because I'm some superhero or some super. You know, the illusion of the confident guy who just has no critic, who's kicked it aside. That's not how it works. It works by relating to your critic, by talking to your critic. And I started doing that. I started to learn how to do that and to relate to it and say, you're. You're really pissed at me right now, but what are you really scared of? Oh, okay. What else? I get it. I wouldn't want to feel that any either. That is scary. And I started doing this again and again and again and it shifted and I started to become more and more on my own side. And now I like who I am, and it feels amazing. And the same is possible for you. You just got to follow these simple steps and really shifting the way. And you might say, well, that's not manly. I should be a man. And just. And I had one client who said that. He's like, eh, I like it, but it seems a little soft and not very masculine. It should be manly. I was like, okay, well, how would a masculine guy, a manly guy, handle it if he had a critic? And he's like, well, he'd kick him to the curb. I'm like, okay, that sounds good. That's what the movies tell us. Your tough characters, your James Bond, your Russell Crowe would do, just punch the critic in the gut. But guess what? James Bond, Russell Crowe, I mean, these characters are like stone cold drinking, distant from their female partners, distant from their kids. Murderous killer. I mean, like, these are the models that we're looking at. What are you, like a double agent, you know, gonna slay some people in Nigeria? No, you're just a dude living wherever you're living in the world, trying to love people and connect with people and have a great life. And that involves being kind and gentle with this critic, with loving this critic. And that is your action step for today, actually. That brings us to the action step. Time for action. Your action step. Yeah, I love how intense that is for. For this action step, which is to. To love yourself, to do this process with your critic, to identify your critic, to find out what he's scared of and validate him, and then to offer him some sort of safety or reassurance. That is your process. Practice this stuff. And if you want to go even deeper with this, check out the confidence code. It's an all new version, version 2.0, that goes even more into what I call optimal self coaching. How to totally rewire your brain for how you relate to yourself, how you work with yourself, how you talk to yourself. And you're going to learn even more strategies which radically improves your self esteem. So if you want to go even deeper, check out that program. But the key here is that your beloved monster is tough and if she wants, she can destroy you. But if you lay her down for a kiss, her little heart it could explode. So until we speak again, may you have the courage to be who you are. The courage to face your critic. The courage to step up and do something totally new and totally different that could free you and thus finding and knowing that you're awesome. I'll talk to you soon.

Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to social confidencecenter.com.

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