Why Am I So Hard On Myself

[00:00:00] Hello, before we start today's episode, if you would like a condensed version of what I'm talking about in this podcast, go ahead and subscribe to the Perfectionist guide. You can read the entire thing in three minutes or less. To access this, go to CourtneyLupGavin.com slash newsletter. Are you a bit of a perfectionist? Type A hyper performer? Then you know...

[00:00:30] Perfectionism is a constant god-awful companion. But it doesn't have to be. If you are ready to burn bright instead of burning out, to lead without losing yourself and to enjoy the life you have worked so hard to create then keep listening.

[00:00:46] I'm your host, America's leader on rewiring perfectionism, CLG. And this is Perfectionism Rewired, the podcast. Welcome to Perfectionism Rewired. Today we are talking about when you want freedom from perfectionism. If you are not empowered by your perfectionism or being a perfectionist, it's because you're doing this one thing wrong and as a perfectionistic person, we do not like...

[00:01:16] to get things wrong. This is the episode we are setting things right. Morning mind gasms ahead, that's like when you blow your mind and it is orgasmic with epiphanies.

[00:01:28] This episode is also the eighth reason why self-criticism feels like it can't stop won't stop. By listening to the entire episode at regular speed because I'm a Californian, I talk fast.

[00:01:44] You'll finally be able to make sense of the real reason why you replay your mistakes on repeat inside your head or are so effing hard on yourself or compare yourself to others all the time.

[00:01:59] And if you are not immediately the best, it's something new keeps you up until 3am. Taking a punitive approach to yourself is the eighth and the overarching theme,

[00:02:11] the tree trunk where the branch of the self-criticism cycles come from. I saved this eighth reason for last because today in Western society, we don't even recognize how dysfunctional this particular flavor of self-criticism cycle is because we live in a culture that actively promotes a punitive approach as the go to response for unwanted behavior.

[00:02:37] It starts with timeouts, spanking, getting toys or items you love taking away, being grounded, detention.

[00:02:43] Even going beyond the educational system, we're living in a retrobueut of culture globally. Someone says something we don't like. Cancel them, sue them, make them pay.

[00:02:56] It totally makes complete sense. You've internalized self-criticism and being punitive towards yourself as your go to tool for the qualities you don't like seen in yourself.

[00:03:09] What totally does not make sense is for you to continue using self-criticism, let's step into the truth both here.

[00:03:16] If you want to slice decades off your lifespan, if you want to look like an overcooked top potato, if you want to suck the joy and the life and the goodness out of every room you walk into,

[00:03:29] if you want to be exhausting and feel awful, if you want to spread your little black rain cloud energy everywhere and to be a warning label to your family, friends, colleagues in community.

[00:03:44] If that's what you want, I highly encourage you to keep on keeping on with the self-criticism and taking a punitive approach.

[00:03:54] In fact, maybe you actually want to take it up a notch. I don't think this is the podcast for you. What I would recommend is go listen to a recovering perfectionist podcast where you can feel extra inferior and inadequate.

[00:04:08] Just go and fight mortal combat against yourself. But if that's not you, and I hope that's not you, for those of you who are leaders and want to be empowered and liberated and end permanently forever, the self-criticism cyclone,

[00:04:24] and to be a shining example of positive change, let's keep going.

[00:04:28] Approaching yourself punitively is not conscious, it's unconscious. I've never met any perfectionist that is like, hey, how can I punish myself today?

[00:04:39] Hmm, let's see, what can I bring over to my critics corner? That isn't what happens. What happens is it registers consciously as you feel stuck.

[00:04:51] I've worked with thousands of perfectionists, and it is rare. Like I can count on one hand a high achieving perfectionistic person will work with me, say they're stuck,

[00:05:04] and it's legit because they're confused about what's happening, and they're like dumbfounded on what to do about it. Super, super rare.

[00:05:15] 98% of the time, you know exactly what to do or not to do. You are dialed in on knowing what to do to improve your life, and yet you're struggling to do it.

[00:05:29] And the reason why you're struggling is because you are locked into self-criticism cycles.

[00:05:34] You feel a lot of desperation. Like I just need to escape this perfectionism man, yet you repeatedly make the same unuseful choices.

[00:05:44] I'm not here to placate you. I'm not here to say that oh we just have an inner critic and that's okay. It's like no, it's not okay.

[00:05:52] Like oh my three-year-old is just running around with a huge butcher knife, whatever, maybe they'll lose a finger. We don't really need 10 anyway. I saw Ted talk about it.

[00:06:01] It's like no, you go in there and you grab that knife and you're like stop. We don't run around with knives. Same thing with the self-criticism cycles.

[00:06:13] I'm going to go through all the reasons why this matters and I'm not holding anything back.

[00:06:19] When you use self-criticism, you become the warden of your own prison doomed to repeat the same miserable mistakes over and over and over while hating yourself for it the entire time.

[00:06:30] But CLG, if I'm not self-criticizing, how am I going to make any changes? Like I don't want to reward being a loser. None of you are losers by the way.

[00:06:40] So like even if you are able to get self-criticism to work, it's like a broken clock is right twice a day.

[00:06:48] Criticizing the crap out of yourself is still gorgeously ineffective because all self-criticism does is it just creates more problems.

[00:06:59] I want you to think of it like, you know what? I'm sick of my neighbor leaving out their trash. So I'm just going to go shoot them.

[00:07:07] I'm going to go shoot them dead. Yeah. That does make it that that neighbor is no longer leaving out their trash but you also created a whole new host of problems, including murder and getting a lawyer.

[00:07:19] And you're probably thinking we'll see it. I would never do that. But it's like, but you are doing that.

[00:07:25] When you criticize yourself and hyper focus on your mistakes, yeah. You might achieve the superficial benefit of I'm not doing that again.

[00:07:34] But I want you to look at this just like the murdering your neighbor who leaves out their trash. Yeah, you might achieve that shallow gain.

[00:07:42] But that shallow gain is at the massive opportunity cost of you taking a wrecking ball to your titanium foundation.

[00:07:52] Like the big ticket items in your life, what are those big ticket items? Um, your confidence, your parenting, your adaptability, your self trust, your integrity, your peace, your presence, your self loyalty, your resilience and your ability to take initiative.

[00:08:10] You kill curiosity and momentum because self criticism cycles and being punitive with yourself is demoralizing.

[00:08:20] You become a place where growth and creativity go to die. Here's a mind gasm for you. You're not actually addressing the problem or the issue or what it is that you want to change when you self criticize.

[00:08:37] What you're actually doing is you're avoiding the problem and you are creating a new one. A lot of new ones, right?

[00:08:45] Just like if you were to go and murder your neighbor about the trash, you're avoiding the problem of why is it that my neighbor leaving out its trash bothers me so much.

[00:08:54] Why am I fixated on this? What am I making this mean about me? What am I making this mean about what the neighbor is doing?

[00:09:01] And instead of working on that, why do I even give a fuck? Why am I even spending my energetic currency on my junky neighbor who just leaves out their trash and doesn't care

[00:09:12] to have a beautiful environment in the neighborhood? Why, if they want to live in garbage, down they can, why do I care?

[00:09:20] Why am I trying to control what my neighbor does? Why am I trying to control everything around me in order to feel okay? That's what you look into.

[00:09:27] Also, self criticism, it's reactive. It's not proactive and until you rewire your perfectionistic tendencies that revolve around punitive behavior towards yourself

[00:09:42] and self criticism cycles. Study after study shows that your mind will always default to self criticism and punishment.

[00:09:52] How this shows up is it's the constant comparing yourself to others, never good enough, etc.

[00:09:57] That will stay the automatic cruise control of your Ferrari drive unless you rewire.

[00:10:04] The second reason why you might want to stop effective immediately and get some support to rewire your self criticism cycles is that when you are in a self criticism cycle,

[00:10:15] you are operating at a bare minimum instead of bringing premium quality love and premium quality energy and just like premium quality you to the table.

[00:10:25] And it's not just in the moment when you're self criticizing, when like this is your go to tool for like I messed up so let's overthink this mistake for three days.

[00:10:34] That is a self criticism cycle that is punitive behavior when you are engaging in that you're like bare minimum Betsy over here and this is the thing we've talked about this you are not average Annie you're not mediocre Molly that's not you okay you're not here to be average.

[00:10:51] Sometimes the self criticism it's like how could I be so stupid I always mess everything up I might as well just stop trying I'm so bad at this.

[00:11:01] But a lot of times it also shows up like you go to the spa or you get your nails done or you book a massage or you let yourself sit down on the couch and catch up on a show or watch the game with your friends there is this running commentary in your head.

[00:11:19] It's like you should not be doing this. You have so many other things to do you're such a slacker so you're not even able to relax because all that you're doing is just interrupting your presence with whipping yourself the whole time.

[00:11:36] I want you to imagine that you're a plant every time that you self criticize you are stomping on that plan.

[00:11:42] You want your plan to grow yet you're stomping on it that's what happens when you self criticize criticizing yourself for your own good.

[00:11:50] But what you're actually doing you are diminishing your ability to be accountable you're weakening your integrity and killing your ability for growth and change.

[00:12:03] You might be like well you know it's what I've always done except taking a punitive approach never works always and everywhere just look at the United States prison system if you need an example.

[00:12:14] We are a first world country with the biggest prison population globally this is just such a clutch example because perfectionism and being a perfectionist feels like you're in prison before you rewire.

[00:12:27] When you stomp on the plant you don't actually learn anything when you self criticize you're not learning how to change what you're doing is you are learning to avoid the source of the pain that you are inflicting upon yourself.

[00:12:43] Here's your next mind gasm when you are the source of your own pain aka self criticism then what you learn to do is to avoid yourself.

[00:12:54] I'm pausing intentionally for a moment to let that sink in when you are the source of your own pain aka self criticism because self criticism is pain that you're putting on yourself.

[00:13:10] You learn to avoid yourself you're teaching yourself conscious and unconscious hey being with myself being present is torturous so we want to make sure that we're not here very often.

[00:13:22] Now you might be asking CLG how can I avoid myself if I'm with me all the time oh let me count the ways you know that you're avoiding yourself anytime that you are overeating meaning that you know that you're full that you're just continuing to eat anyway anytime you're over drinking not talking about getting wasted or binging here i'm talking about when you override yourself and what it is that you're feeling when you're overspending.

[00:13:52] When you're just shopping and buying shit because.

[00:13:56] You can it makes you feel good for a second when you go in a store and people treat you really importantly for me it was like I had all these fancy things i still do have fancy things but it's like I would have all this nice new stuff because I felt that it made me sparkly

[00:14:12] and that it would hide the fact of like how awful I felt about myself you know look at my new fendipag if you are over cleaning but doesn't feel worthwhile but you're like still doing it because you want to avoid your mindlessly scrolling your binging shows you don't even like that much you're getting caught up on celebrity drama as a distraction tactic.

[00:14:33] You are misusing substances you are over medicating yourself you are over volunteering you are over exercising exercising all of those keep you stuck in the self criticism cycle and in prison.

[00:14:47] perfectionistic people we often think that we're stuck in a cycle of over working or people pleasing or overextending ourselves but after digging a little deeper using the tools that I created inside of perfectionism optimized able to see

[00:15:02] oh I get it now i've been solving for the wrong problem this whole time no wonder all the books podcast therapy sessions group coaching meditation soundbaths haven't worked when you are that plant in order to create sustainable growth you got to understand the patterns causing the problems in this simple analogy it was easy to see well yeah CLG your stomping on the plant and you are starving it you're saying you don't deserve water

[00:15:31] I'm going to put you in a dark closet this is a plant let's say that needs like lots of direct sunlight or you know what I'm going to do I'm just going to make you get root rot and I am not going to put you in a bigger planner because you need to learn you need to learn your lesson.

[00:15:46] What is the solve for self criticism and taking a punitive approach to yourself which is the eighth and the overarching theme the tree trunk where the branch of the self criticism

[00:15:59] self criticism cycles come from there are three things you need to have in order to solve an evolve which is a patented concept I teach you inside of perfectionism optimized so the three things are one you gotta have a crystal clear understanding of your patterns

[00:16:20] and the impact that they are having on you right now it's not just a knowing intellectually or logically understanding it's like an inner knowing it's like oh I get it that's number one number two is that you discover more useful alternatives

[00:16:38] you identify okay these are my other tools that I can go to and then the third thing is that you believe you are capable of changing sans criticism not even just believe because I feel like believe can be like sort of a re ferry sometimes but it's like you take a strong stance of like I'm taking the narrative back

[00:16:59] you decide that you are no longer advocating that being the CEO of you you are taking the narrative back and you are like I don't want anyone that is in my orbit to inherit the self criticism I no longer want to be a warning label to my children

[00:17:17] because even if you read all the books and listen you know big little emotions and you do the wonder the wonder I'm thinking the wonder years but I know that isn't the name of the app that I look at every day

[00:17:28] even if you are like parenting pro when you still have this going on in your internal world they're attuning to you naturally as humans we attune to each other it's why when they say when women live together that their cycles sync up that's why we're magnets for each other and what's going on on the inside

[00:17:47] your children are going to inherit this unless you change it you might be like what how is it that I haven't noticed this because you haven't rewired yet you're going to you might be to turn it around on yourself and just be like I'm such a shitty parent but here's what I want you to know self criticism let's stop it okay it's lazy it's cheap and all you're doing is you're just pouring acid pain on top of what's actually there

[00:18:12] so in this example of like let's say you listen to this and you're like oh my gosh I do not want to pass us onto my children I have passed us onto my children this is why my teenagers are so difficult right now or maybe your kids are out of the house and you have grandchildren and you're like I don't I can't do this I want to be the best Mimi ever

[00:18:30] I want you to know one that's not helpful let's turn it around let's do a U-turn you don't need to tolerate anything in your life anymore and if you are

[00:18:39] tolerating then I invite you to come work with me inside of perfectionism optimize one on one coaching it's the place where there is no judgment and there's also no bullshit

[00:18:50] I am your champion I'm in your corner and I am also the one person in your life that will tell you the truth

[00:18:57] you can work with your perfectionism you don't need to fight against it there's nothing wrong with you there's nothing wrong with being a perfectionist

[00:19:04] there's nothing wrong with being ashamed of it all you need to do is just learn how to work with it

[00:19:09] and it is so much more fun it is so much more fierce you are not meant to be a zoo animal you are meant to roam free

[00:19:17] and if you want to be free then I invite you to go to cornylovegavin.com slash optimized

[00:19:24] in the next episode we are going to look at self criticism up close what it is that we are confusing it with

[00:19:31] and how you can take a proactive stand in your life listen up taking charge of your perfectionism

[00:19:39] is so much easier than you have been led to believe whether you want to stop playing out worst case

[00:19:45] scenarios in your head or be joyfully present ambitious again you don't need more rigid rules

[00:19:53] guesswork or hard work and perfectionism recovery you need a framework that helps you understand

[00:20:00] and most importantly rewire your perfectionistic habits from the inside out it starts inside of

[00:20:07] perfectionism optimized besides the obvious mental health and wellness benefits rewiring your

[00:20:14] perfectionism is the fastest way to figure out what's really underneath your perfectionistic patterns

[00:20:21] this radically different proven proprietary approach helps you succeed by dropping the contempt and

[00:20:28] judgment that blocks change discover how to trust yourself take control of your world and feel

[00:20:35] truly empowered to own your perfectionism instead of being owned by it head on over to cornylovegavin.com

[00:20:44] and start your transformation today