Tony Blair vs The Inner Critic: Round 1

Okay, first, I think that directly talking back to an Inner Critic is useless. I've tried. Heaven knows, I've tried. But I think that finding another internally supportive voice, or self, can be really helpful.

Back in the Dark Ages, the late 1970s, when I was trying to understand romantic love, the only thing out there for me was information on therapy group cohesion. (Honest, I am trying to address the Inner Critic issue here...) Cohesion, it seemed, was a "magnifying variable" that amplified outcome for group members (though, admittedly, one could not predict which direction the outcome would take--great improvement or great destruction). Theorists were writing about which groups stayed together (demonstrating greater cohesion) and which ones disbanded quickly (demonstrating inadequate cohesion). It seemed that having some negatives improved group credibility, but that too many negatives, relative to the number of positives, destroyed cohesion because they made group members so uncomfortable they wouldn't go back to the group.

What was the ideal negative-to-positive ratio? Well, it appeared that no negatives made the group not credible and, therefore, not viable, but less than four positives to every negative was considered too encountering, making it feel too unsafe. It seemed that a good solid group, then, could be achieved by running an absolute minimum of four or more positives to every negative.

More recently, the work of John Gottman and colleagues (see www.gottman.com) has shown that a minimum of five positives to every negative (5:1) is one of the most critical factors in sustaining relationship health.

Bear with me... I really am going somewhere with this...

Sometimes, things that aren't exactly the same just seem to fit together in my head. And, in this instance, I can't help making a bit of a leap from the inter-personal (macrocosm) to the intra-personal (microcosm): Doesn't it make sense to apply both the group therapy and Gottman couples' data to our internal environments just as we do to our external (interpersonal) environments? Thus, we could conclude that, if you aren't receiving five positives to every negative about yourself, you may be headed for a divorce... from yourself!

But how can we get that ratio up amidst other people getting periodically upset with us and constant criticism from our Inner Critics so fraught with panic that they work overtime trying to protect us from ever sticking our necks out? Well, surrounding ourselves with loving, positive friends and loved ones is certainly a good first step. But other people will never keep up with our Inner Critics so we'd better get busy with self-appreciation as well! Fortunately, we all have a Good Mother somewhere inside that can think of endless things about us that are simply charming and genuinely miraculous. And that's the go-to self for this mission, I'd say...

As for me and my Inner Critic around that Terrible Email Blunder, I feel truly blessed... I got well over a five-to-one ratio of positives to negatives from all of you so THANK YOU! And in addition to that, my Inner Mother is pretty consistently loving and strong.

Maybe it would help Tony if we all wrote him some compliments...

© Nancy Young 2010