“When there is no enemy within, the enemies outside cannot hurt you.”

The enemy within you is more dangerous than any other enemy you will ever come across. It is an enemy that works in secret and wields immense power. It is an enemy that will use any means available to sabotage your happiness and frustrate your life. You need to be aware of this enemy. You must understand it and you must know how to deal with it.

It is your inner critic that keeps telling you lies. Lies such as “you will never amount to anything; you can’t be wealthy; you are not capable of running your own family; you’re not good enough or intelligent ; you’re not pretty enough; you’re a bad parent; you cannot quit smoking; you can’t lose all that weight.” The list is endless.

You will find it far easier to dismiss other people’s negativity towards you, but find it much harder to deal with your own negative thoughts, emotions and judgement about yourself. The reason is that we are able to recognise easily when other people are criticising us and judging us. We may not know exactly how do deal with it, but we are aware of it.

When the criticism is from yourself, however, it is much harder to recognise it. You might just feel low, unhappy, lacking in energy, lacking drive or just plain unenthusiastic about your life or whatever venture you are involved in at the time.

The first step to fighting the enemy within is to be aware that there is an enemy and that he is not looking out for your best interests.

A good way to deal with this self criticism is to give yourself the support you deserve. When you do something well it is important to reward yourself and build up on that success. Over time this will push out the self critical scripting in your mind and make you more positive in your outlook.

Do not seek to shut off your inner critic completely. It does serve an important purpose if kept in check. Self criticism is essential to your personal growth and development. Without a good understanding of your weaknesses you will go around thinking that you are perfect and not in need of any change. This extreme can also be self defeating.

The important thing is to realize that the critic is there and that what that critic says does not have to be your reality.