When upgrading (as a HSP) feels daunting, here's why the inner critic shows up more and more - 6 Journal prompts to give you clarity

When we think about our lives, we always aim for bigger and better things. Even when things are not exactly the way we want right now, we are constantly aiming for bigger things. And there’s nothing wrong with that, it’s how we tend to evolve. For most of us, evolving can look a bit daunting because somehow, we don’t feel as though we’re ready yet. Or we succumb to external pressure and think we’re not ready just yet.

When a big shift or upgrade is required, things tend to feel like they’re falling apart. Everything starts to appear chaotic and messy. We also might experience some monotony in the routine and somehow feel depleted and also anxious. We also feel a bit helpless and somehow make excuses to not work on the change. Change of course is really challenging and difficult. Understandably so, however, when we need to make that change, we tend to get overwhelmed and scared.

We know in our bones that we may need to let go of something in order to move on and evolve. But something always gets in the way and we find ourselves creating blockages for our own happiness. We try to convince ourselves and try to go back into known misery because that feels familiar and comfortable. And because we feel like we may need to start all over again, we hold back. We try to adjust and start then the stagnation grows on us.

I’ve noticed this happen many times in my life and what I infer from this is that we aren’t necessarily starting over. Mostly because we’re not the same people we were yesterday and the day before that. We change over time, our thoughts, beliefs, and habits change over time and we behave and think from the version we are currently which is already an upgraded version of how we began originally.

Sometimes it’s just the fear of uncertainty that tends to get in our way of making certain changes that may feel too much for us to deal with so we convince ourselves that we don’t need to necessarily make any changes.

In the fourth week of the Pause Breathe Dream, counselling and coaching program, I delve into the inner critic and the impact it has on the choices, beliefs, and patterns that my clients could be dealing with and coping with.

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In my experience, when I’m working with clients and when they feel overwhelmed regarding upgrading, it’s usually because they find it difficult to let go of the connection, they’ve worked very hard to build. And understandably it makes sense to feel a sense of attachment towards something that would’ve taken a lot of work and patience to build over time.

But sometimes this fear also comes from a place of scarcity and self-doubt. Even though most clients know that they need to make those changes and upgrade they’re really afraid of whether they’ll get something worse than what they have right now. What if they aren’t happy with the changes they eventually make? What if it goes all very wrong?

This fear tends to get in their way. This is where their inner critic plays an important role in their lives. Our inner critic in some capacity pops up in our minds when we’re afraid of making necessary changes. Our inner dialogues tend to tell us things that only reinforce our self-doubt and lack of self-confidence.

When we quietly listen to what our inner critic tells us instead of getting afraid and instead of feeling overwhelmed by it, we unearth a lot of our prejudice and certain illusions about ourselves. When we work on these illusions and try to befriend our inner critic, we tend to realize that it’s not as big and challenging as it appears to us.

In my opinion, we’re conditioned to think in a certain way. we’re conditioned to be extra careful and extra cautious about the risks we’re taking in our lives. We often relate the word upgrade with risk and that can make everything a lot bigger and more challenging than it factually might be. In some capacity, our inner critic is here to help us understand the errors we made in the past and this can help us make better decisions in the present.

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Anytime this happens to me nowadays, I try to not react to my inner critic and gently challenge it so I can feel confident to make the changes I’m afraid to make. Since I like journaling, I try to write it all down to make sense of things.

I’d like to invite you to do the same, ask your inner critic simple questions and allow the answers to flow.

1. What is your inner critic trying to tell you?

2. Is there a pattern you notice?

3. Why has your inner critic popped up right now?

4. Where is this coming from?

5. Does this remind you of an incident or phase in your life?

6. Are you experiencing any physical stress along with emotional and mental stress?

7. How can you gently challenge your inner critic?

8. What is the next step you need to take in order to upgrade?

I hope these prompts help you understand better and help you upgrade in the way you need to.

Thank you for reading.

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