It’s the internal voice whose strict, unbending standards can make us miserable. But tuning in to it can change everything
When I first became her patient, I heard everything my therapist said as a criticism. Almost every word that came out of her mouth, I received as a telling off, a character assassination or a low mark. I thought to myself: “I’m paying this woman to help me and all she’s doing is criticising me! How rude!”
Here’s a made-up example that has a lot of truth in it: if I lost my mobile phone and described my feelings of panic, she might respond with something along the lines of: “You crazy woman, can you not be more robust? How can you be overwhelmed by something like losing your phone? Can you not be more chill? More resilient? Thank God my other patients are not this basic.”
