Tag Archives: Teens

On the last track, you met Josie who was being influenced by her own father’s drive for perfection.  After identifying that her father, Randall, was being manifested in her critic, Josie was ready to annihilate her inner critic with Randall’s help.  In this track, we will expand this developing communication skill.

Technique #1. Unmasking the Critic’s Purpose
The first step to destroy the critic permanently is unmasking the critic’s purpose.  I asked 17 year old Josie to look beyond the consequences of her critic and try to uncover the motives behind the critic’s statements.  For Josie, this meant analyzing her own social incompetence.

She stated “I recently have had trouble at school with friends.  Actually, I don’t have very many.  I just recently realized that I was comparing myself to my friends.  I had to be as good at basketball, or be the president of NHS, or captain of the speech team.  There was no room for second place.  I realize now that that was my critic talking, telling me to work harder.  At some point, I realized I could not work any harder.  If I did, I would kill myself.”

Randall, her father, took part in unmasking her critic.  He stated, “I know when she’s stressed.  It’s easy to tell.  She gets really irritable, so when I see that, I’m thinking ‘Critic’s talking again.’  I sit down with her and we both go through her feelings and activities together.”  As you can see, her father is taking an active role in repairing the damage his own drive for perfection has done to his oppositional defiant teen.

For Technique #2  and #3 go to  Parenting Course