Everyone, no matter their level of success in life, struggles with their inner critic.

The negative voice tells lies to keep you safe. It’s your brain’s defense mechanism against danger.

Anxiety acts as a guardian angel. Its intentions are pure, but we all know the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

When it comes to life or death situations, your anxiety protects you. But in the trenches of day to day modern life, we rarely encounter a life or death situation that warrants such an extreme measure. Anxiety acts like a guardian, but it can cause us to not act.

Learning to reframe your anxiety is important, so it doesn’t get in the way of your writing.Because the inner critic isn’t objective, whenever you find yourself at conflict with it.

Try to imagine the good that could come out of your writing. Even if what you write today doesn’t turn into something you can use, it is an exercise toward good writing in the end. Think of yourself as an athlete who has to practice before he/she gets really good. Your inner narrator should keep you grounded without discouraging you from moving forward. Don’t silence your inner critic. Think of it as a way to go in the opposite direction of what it wants you to do.

Turn the negative self-talk into an empowering message. Every time you hear yourself thinking that you’re not good enough, that your negative traits are far too many, that it’s not worth it, that it’s not fair, you tell yourself that it’s not so.

After all, the inner critic is kind of dumb, far from objective, and even though its intentions are good, it won’t help you get to where you want to go.

Anxiety, negative self talk, self-doubt should act as triggers to turn them into something that empowers you.

Charles Bukowski almost didn’t become the writer he had always dreamt of being. He worked in a post-office until his fifties, even though he tried and often failed to earn enough from his writing so he could quit his job.

Abraham Lincoln failed time and time again. He lost his bid for State Legislature when he was 23 years old. Six years later, he lost his bid to become Speaker in the Illinois House of Representatives.In 1848, at the age of 39, Lincoln failed to become Commissioner of the General Land Office in D.C. Ten years later, he failed to become a U.S. Senator.

If we try, we might fail. If we give it our all, we might fail. Sometimes I do believe the universe tests our commitment, and I often find that the people who try and fail, never, ever want to try again.

So, what’s the trick?

Follow your heart and intuition. There’s a dream hidden somewhere inside a drawer of your soul you rarely open.

“Do or do not, there is no try.” – Yoda

This is one of those clever quotes that get passed around quite often. When it’s do or die, most people tend to do.

Sometimes we don’t have to step outside our comfort zone. Sometimes we don’t have to take massive action in order to reach a certain goal.

Have you ever chosen not to do something because you were absolutely certain you’d fail?You were so sure you couldn’t, so you didn’t even try.

Doing the impossible will often lead to failure. But if we aim to do the bit that’s possible, if we just give it a try, then we might surprise ourselves by becoming good enough to do what we previously thought of as impossible.

The obvious paradox is that you never know if something’s impossible or not unless you try.Our attitude always determines our altitude in life. When we think we can’t do something, there’s no reason to even try.

It’s better to try something than to give up without even attempting just because you believe that you must do it.

Edison’s famous invention of the light bulb stands testimony to just how powerful such a mindset is. The trick that allowed him to persevere until successful was that he re-framed his failures as, “finding ways that don’t work.”

You, like Edison, you could try to do it before you can decide if it can or can’t be done.

I’ll be blogging on Thursdays. Follow me here.

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