The Writer’s Inner Critic: 11 Ways to Tell if Yours Is Healthy

Ah, the writer’s inner critic. It’s that wily inner editor who has such a way of getting in the last word (and first and middle words) on any writing session or project. Most of the time when writers speak of the inner critic, there’s a fair amount of self-deprecating exaggeration of how ruthless that little voice can be. We joke about the inner critic as a universal experience, but for many writers at one time or another, the inner editor can turn into a counter-productive tyrant.

And yet, as I wrote long ago, the inner editor is really a writer’s friend. When healthy, the inner critic is that guide in our heads showing us how to improve. Every writer needs an editor after all. Without a healthy inner critic, our writing would inevitably drown in a sea of self-indulgence. The critic in our heads drives us to be better, to discipline our technique, to exert the energy and effort to do our best—and then learn how to make it better.

So why do so many writers struggle with their inner editor? Ultimately, the problem, of course, is not the inner critic/editor or the fact we have one, but rather with certain toxic manifestations or patterns. In short: the problem is that the inner critic is all too often unhealthy. Even writers who are able to consistently access their healthy inner critic may still find that certain unhealthy patterns crop up in certain areas of their process.

The question I’m exploring today is how to increase the health and effectiveness of the very necessary inner critic while diminishing the unhealthy effects of unbalanced and ineffective toxicity.

6 Signs of the Unhealthy Inner Critic1. Projects “Inner Critic” Outside of Oneself

Most of the time when writers talk about the “inner critic” or the “inner editor,” they’re referencing the unhealthy version, at least in part. When everything is clicking along smoothly up there in our writing brains, we usually don’t even think about the inner critic as something or someone who exists outside of ourselves. When the inner critic is healthy, it is not a “voice in your head”—it is you.

The toxic inner critic, however, is often a projection—an aspect of ourselves we’ve tried to separate into our “not-selves.”

The toxic inner editor may take on the voice of an early authority figure whose criticism shaped you.It might take on the voice of a recent editor or critique partner.Or, simply, it might present itself in the guise of “your readers” (who, in this instance, seem a very hard bunch to please).

Regardless, the voice is not you. You may not even believe in or agree with the criticisms, which are usually more personal in nature (e.g., “you suck”) rather than specific to the project (e.g., “you need write more active sentences in this chapter”).

Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg (affiliate link)

Recognizing when the inner critic’s voice is not an integrated part of your own mind is helpful for undermining its power over you. The legendary Natalie Goldberg had much to say in her writings about the inner critic. In Writing Down the Bones, she noted:

The more clearly you know the [inner] editor, the better you can ignore it.

2. Focuses on Binary Ideas of Success vs. Failure

Usually, the unhealthy version of your inner critic is primarily concerned with binary ideas of success and failure. Either that rough chapter you just wrote is gold or (more likely) it’s tripe. The toxic inner editor knows few other distinctions.

When you find the voice in your head piping up with generalizations of your work, you can usually recognize this as a sign you’re engaged with the unhealthy version. In contrast, the healthy inner critic recognizes that art, like life, is extremely open-ended. Indeed, by its very definition, editing is supposed to about the ability to alter and improve things—over and over and over again. There is no true failure in art; there is only the decision by the artist at some point to move on.

Wild Mind by Natalie Goldberg (affiliate link)

In Wild Mind, Goldberg put it:

Failure is a hard word for people to take. Use the word kindness instead. Let yourself be kind. And this kindness comes from an understanding of what it is to be a human being. Have compassion for yourself when you write. There is no failure—there is just a big field to wander in.

3. Criticizes Without True Construction

If the true purpose of editing is to improve your writing, then the only successful editor is one who helps you achieve that. The only way an editor can accomplish that goal is by offering constructive criticism.

What exactly is constructive criticism? I think we often hear the phrase as basically “nice or kind critique.” But truly it is “a critique that constructs or builds.” If all your inner critic is doing is blindly and chaotically tearing down you and your work, it’s probably not building.

Now, it’s true that sometimes you have to rip down what doesn’t work before you can build something that does. But a healthy critic will first show you why the existing structure is faulty and needs to go. If that voice in your head is a demand to destroy with no guidance for how build back better, that’s a toxic voice.

4. Shames or Guilt-Trips

At its most unhealthy, the inner critic not only undermines your confidence in yourself and your work, it even goes so far as to drag up feelings of shame or even guilt. Rooted in life patterns that go far deeper than the writing life, these feelings are usually very real and, as a result, very potent. But when examined objectively, they usually have no realistic grounding or context within the work itself. After all, is shame ever going to be a truly proportionate response to something as inconsequential as writing a dumb story?

The first step here is simply to realize that, however real the feelings of shame or guilt may be in your life, they probably have nothing to do with your writing. Even if you’re the worst writer in the world (which if you care enough to be reading a blog like this is highly unlikely), your writing is nothing to feel unworthy about. In fact, as far as I’m concerned, your incredible courage in writing at all would seem to indicate just the opposite. Regardless, try to disconnect the deeper feelings from the act of writing or from your inner critic. These feelings will still likely need to be explored, but realizing your writing isn’t legitimate fuel for them can be helpful in getting to their root and initiating healing.

5. Creates Writer’s Block

If you find your motivation for writing decreasing rather than increasing, that’s usually a pretty good sign you’re dealing with at least aspects of an unhealthy inner critic. Many different factors can cause us to flinch beneath the weight of even excellent criticism (from ourselves or others), but if that voice in your head is telling you, “You should quit,” rather than, “Keep going!” that’s a signal it’s unhealthy. (Of course, you must use your own judgment and knowledge of yourself. It’s always a possibility that a grounded and healthy inner voice may tell you your best course is to move on in the right time and the right circumstances.)

6. Other-Referencing More Than Self-Referencing

Finally, as indicated in Point #1 above, an unhealthy inner critic is usually more concerned with what others think than what you think. It’s the voice that tells you, “Your mom will hate this, your 3rd-grade teacher would hate this, your friends will hate this, your publisher will hate this, your readers will hate this.” Sometimes those thoughts may be true (and even, in certain circumstances, worth considering).

But you also have to ask yourself, “What do you think?” What do you really think about yourself, your story, your writing, and your current range of ability? The answer may be that, in fact, you do need to do some work. But it may also be that, in the face of anyone else’s disapproval, you’re actually quite happy and aligned with where you’re at. (Take that, inner voice!)

However, you may also find that you don’t know what you think. If, like so many people, you have relied on the inner critic to tell you who you are, it may take some significant digging to get back in touch with the true self-knowing that will tell you your own truths.

5 Signs of the Healthy Inner Critic1. Neutral, Not Negative

So what does your inner critic sound like when it’s healthy and balanced? For starters, it may indeed still sound pretty critical. The difference is that the healthy inner critic’s voice will be emotionally neutral, not negative. It may tell you hard truths about your writing, things you don’t really want to hear. But it won’t do so from a place of belittlement. The healthy inner critic may say, “This story isn’t working, like, at all.” But it won’t say, “This story isn’t working—ergo you suck, ergo you should be ashamed, ergo you should probably just quit right now.”

Part of the journey to cultivating a healthy inner critic is learning not only to discern between neutral criticism and negative criticism, but also in learning how not to be triggered by useful neutral criticism. Recognize it for the help it is, bravely face the work it demands, and realize it is not passing judgment on you but rather just on the work of the moment.

2. Offers Questions More Than Answers…

I can always tell my inner critic is at its best when it is more inclined to ask questions rather than proffer answers. Part of this is for the obvious reason that because the inner critic is you, it really doesn’t know anymore than you do. Not consciously anyway. But a truly tapped-in inner critic is in touch with your intuition and instinct, and as such, it can gently nudge your conscious brain in the direction of new understandings and epiphanies.

When confronted by a tricky knot in one of your stories, you may not immediately know how to fix it, much less what’s wrong. After all, if you knew better, you wouldn’t have written it that way in the first place, would you? But intuitively, you probably do at least sense that something is wrong. By dialing in to a healthy inner critic in order to start asking questions about this story problem, you have the opportunity to organically learn something new that you didn’t know when you first wrote the story.

3. …But Focuses on Solutions Rather Than Problems

The above is not to say the inner critic never offers answers. But if it’s healthy, it will focus much less on what’s wrong with your story and much more on how to fix it. This is an extension of its ability to teach you through asking questions. Just in being able to ask that one question, “What’s wrong with this?”, you’re already much closer to the solution than if all the critic was offering was a blanket statement: “This is wrong. Fix it.”

4. Specific and Constructive, Rooted in Knowledge Rather Than Negativity

Again, the healthy critic is there to help you solve problems by offering insights that are constructive and specific. Many years ago, I remember reading a great guideline:

Generality is the death of the novel.

I believe the quote’s context was talking about using specific details and characterizations to bring your story to life. But the concept is just as true of criticism. If it’s general, it’s all but useless. If it’s specific, you can act on it.

The only way to cultivate an inner editor who can offer specific advice is by feeding it with information and knowledge. It’s true that if you’re very in touch with your intuition, your inner critic may be able to guide you with relative accuracy. But the more language you have available in your conscious brain by which to recognize, translate, and apply this intuition, the better your working relationship with your inner editor will be.

5. Expansive and Accepting

Finally, a healthy inner critic will be expansive and accepting—instead of constrictive and intolerant. It will not seek to lock you or your creativity into a pre-determined box of “correctness.” While accepting the existing boundaries of what seems to “work” and what apparently does not, it still primarily seeks to help you find a way to say whatever it is you are trying to say in the way that is best suited to you. For many writers, this is a life-long quest. It’s a difficult enough quest with a helpful and aligned inner critic. If that critic is getting in our way, the journey becomes all but impossible.

Goldberg, in Wild Mind, once again:

We have to accept ourselves in order to write. Now none of us does that fully; few of us do it even halfway. Don’t wait for one hundred percent acceptance of yourself before you write, or even eight percent acceptance. Just write. The process of writing is an activity that teaches us about acceptance.

Ultimately, the cultivation of a healthy inner critic stretches far beyond the writing desk and, indeed, opens up the potential for life-changing implications in overcoming personal patterns. Because writing offers such a unique conjunction of the creative brain with the critical brain, it is prime ground for exploring and working through this challenge.

Wordplayers, tell me your opinions! What has your experience taught you about improving the health if your writer’s inner critic? Tell me in the comments!

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