Shadow & Ego Lense
Early on in my childhood the shame and worry of failure conceived the critic. I think I began to judge myself, push myself, and fear mistakes out of trying to succeed and behave. The irony is that the fear created shame and the shame caused hesitation. In learning hesitation only delays the absorption and experiences needed to build confidence and trust. Punishment also plays a significant role in the development of my critic. Because aptitude was measured with achievement I began to protect myself from the harsh effects of criticism by creating an internal judge who could be more critical than societal judges. Societal judges being parents, teachers, peers, and coaches. The critic grew to be more and more severe as I encountered more and more insecurities.
What inspired my critic to be so harsh and severe? I grew up in a culture with shame and embarrassment. Being latino, was at times, seen as a disadvantage or unfortunate burden, especially identifying as lower middle class. This bread insecurity and comparison into my personality. I had disciplined and punishing parenting, although loving I would consider it conservative. My family often focused on improving mistakes and not breaking the rules. I felt pushed, punished, and expected to fit systems. This environment motivated me to criticize myself, discourage myself from experimenting, and hate losing.
I learned to only do the the things I excelled at. As I got older the critic grew darker and more committed to helping me be the best. It helped me to adapt to systems, feed off of scarcity, and take advantage without appearing to do so. I know being little, underdeveloped, and poor didn't help. I think my critic never had the chance to fail gracefully and in contrast tortured myself into competency.
I learned to lie to myself as a strategy for motivation. When I say lie to myself, I like to think of the worst possible friend, and that was my subconscious. In adolescents, sports were my go to activities. I started working out in my 6th to 7th grade summer. I put to bed the child and introduced the professional. My dad and I created a workout schedule that I followed loosely. Regardless I was training. The most difficult realization I have made this round of introspection is body image. I can now remember beginning to compare and observe my progress around this time. I was always little and the younger athlete on my teams because of my August birthdate. I always felt like I had to work harder and convince myself I wasn't ready, good enough, and there was more to practice.
Remember the worst possible friend I mentioned earlier. Well he stuck around despite my aging. That little voice in the back of my head that feeds me shitty thoughts, believing he is just trying to prepare me for the worst so I'm not surprised and let down, is alive and thriving in my psyche. This is the part of me I am working to change. When I would practice this voice would invoke the worst possible names it could to motivate me with anger. When in love he would convince me that I wasn't good enough or remind me of the little I had to offer. In learning he would start me off with how lazy I was with reading, continue with how forgetful I was, and finish it off with a few shortcuts and pity parties.
My ego has been a functional and effective motivator, but not very graceful. I have created self suffering in the form of pity, shame, guilt and regret. I have punished myself continually for my failures. I work diligently on being better and improving. As a result I can say I made it a long way with dysfunctional sidekick. My ego along with my shadow have left a legacy of torment, and surprisingly currently not disrupting my direction change towards a more graceful perspective.
True Self
What does it look like to fail gracefully? I think it would include more encouragement than dissapointment. I think had my family put an emphasis on what I was doing well could have helped me feel more confident with approaching the challenges causing me to fail. Failing gracefully looks more like the measurement of progress versus collection of errors.
I am softening my critic. I have grace and appreciation for the progress it has made. With the use of trust my critic is softening. I am resisting the urge to judge myself in favor of understanding myself. When I fail I first recognize that I made an attempt and that is something to reward. This has allowed myself to forgive my shortcomings and recognize the opportunity to learn from them. This has allowed me to finally see progress after so long being forced to focus on failure. I think for this process it is important to note that writing this paragraph brought me to tears, big crocodile ones, and with them peace. This is a young transition I'm in but so much more efficient. Donald and I talked about not being fast, be fluid, and fluid is fast. Well being graceful is being fluid and the changes in me may not be fast but they will be fluid.
The difficult with my critic is that it is the framework for how how I treat those I love. It has been the default response mechanism for me. It has been the part of me that people grow to despise avoid and even divorce. I won't quit on my critic. If my critic has taught anything it has been that quitting is the trophy for failure. It might be an internal enemy but it is my greatest asset. It is what has always woke me up in the morning and it is the part of me that tells my hands to wipe the tears. It is the part of me that convinces me the pain is just weakness leaving the body. I love you critic, I just can't continue to function without giving you an overhaul.
If my true self had a love song to my critic's ego and shadow it would sound like this.
