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Does your inner critic hold you back? How can you overcome your inner critic to take the driving seat in your life? What can you do to relearn how to get past the inner critic’s mental blocks and make meaningful changes in your life?
In this podcast episode, Melissa Vogel speaks with Joanna Kleinman about dethroning your inner critic.
Meet Joanna Kleinman
Joanna Kleinman is a licensed psychotherapist, life and corporate coach, author, podcaster, motivational speaker, and the founder of Dethroning Your Inner Critic. She considers herself to be an unconventional therapist and is driven by the conviction that the most powerful life you can live is when you know the difference between YOU and your Inner Critic.
She developed the M.I.N.D Method, a time-tested, proven system that brings together practical psychology, neuroscience, and the power of intention to discover who you are separate from the critical voice in your mind. With over 25 years of experience, she has worked with corporations such as Campowerment, Cigna, Nestle, and TD Bank, and has transformed the lives of thousands of people, detailing how they can design a new future by rewiring the automatic way they think and act, and breaking the habit of giving energy and attention to their Inner Critic.
Visit her website and connect on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Listen to Joanna’s podcast here.
In This Podcast
Summary
- How you speak to yourself is more important than the way others do
- We are not taught to think
- Joanna’s 4 steps of the mind-method
- How to remain peaceful and in control?
- How can we prevent stress and burnout?
How you speak to yourself is more important than the way others do
Your inner critic speaks to you all day long and it can seem to limit how you think of yourself and how capable or incapable you perceive your skills to be. You can unhook from this voice. What you say to yourself is more important than what anyone else says to you.
We are not taught to think
Our bodies function on their own and their processes happen almost automatically, but we are in control of our minds yet we are not taught how to use them properly. It is about learning how to intentionally and deliberately think thoughts that enable you to be fully in control of our perception of the world as well as ourselves.
I call my work dethroning your inner critic, I don’t call it silencing or banishing or beating the crap out of her, because you can’t. You can’t every get rid of that voice but you can really learn to develop the ability to see the difference between you … and her, that inner critic. (Joanna Kleinman)
Your inner critic is never fully gotten rid of. It is constant work throughout your life, however, with the right tools you can easily distinguish between yourself and your critic and move the mic from her to you.
Joanna’s 4 steps of the mind-method
- Meet your inner critic: You stop, get quiet and observe all the thoughts of your inner critic. The voice of your inner critic is the same voice from your childhood. Observing when and where and why she says these things.
- Investigate your indication signs: How do you know when your inner critic is speaking to you? What happens to and in your body? What thoughts come up?
- Neutralize the never-ending message: This is the repeated messaged – it stays the same, however it comes up in the form of different messages.
- Design your life: When you understand the first three steps, what do you do now to unhook from her and step into a new mind with thoughts that are aligned with the life you want to design for yourself.
People think that once they reach their goal, that will make them feel good and silence the critic. However, Joanna believes that this is backward and you need to start off by loving yourself where you are right now before working on yourself, instead of viewing yourself as something of a failure or a broken person. Real change only lasts when it comes from the inside out, instead of from the outside in.
Your value needs to come from you to yourself first because if the value system is based on things outside of you it will not matter how many goals you achieve, you will not feel fulfilled until you value where you are now.
How to remain peaceful and in control?
The inner critic mind has a lot of attachments and demands that come up in the form of ‘shoulds’ and ‘could’. These attachments keep us from being at peace because we are constantly trying to control things outside of ourselves.
By practicing new thoughts, such as “I am already good enough” and “I have everything I need” can rewire your brain and turn off these attachments that seek to find value outside of yourself. These thoughts help you focus on gratitude and abundance instead of thinking of the deficit.
To become peaceful and in control, you need to make a mental shift from a mindset of deficits to a mindset of what you are grateful for, what successes you have experienced, and what abundance you have in your life.
The inner critic serves as a form of protection, and in its attempts to protect you it tries to stop you from leaving your comfort zone by criticizing you and making you think that you should not risk leaving your comfort zone because you won’t survive – but you will.
If we’re really going to be designing the most magnificent lives, what that really entails is, number 1; are we willing to be uncomfortable over and over again? And number 2; when we are uncomfortable, when we’re risking failure and rejection … how are we going to think in a way so that we can just be in the discomfort without running away from it or numbing it? (Joanna Kleinman)
How can we prevent stress and burnout?
Our automatic mind creates a lot of stories around the circumstances, which leads to us overcompensating. In the present moment, take the very next action. Take life moment by moment because we do not need to know the next five actions down the road.
We cannot see where life is going, and we experience stress when we try to predict it instead of working and living in the present moment.
Stop buying into the automatic narrative that you are not enough; that is your inner critic, and that is separate from you.
Books by Joanna Kleinman
Dethroning Your Inner Critic: The Four-Step Journey from Self-Doubt to Self-Empowerment
Useful Links:
- Real Talk About Fear and Anxiety with Kristen Ulmer | BM 41
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- Sign up for Busy to Bomb Fit Mom
- Connect with Melissa on Facebook and Instagram
- Email Melissa: info@melissavogelfitness.com
Meet Melissa Vogel

Melissa Vogel is an energetic keynote speaker, business owner, certified personal trainer, certified group fitness instructor, 1st degree Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do, a mother of three, and a podcaster.
Melissa has been voted as the Best Personal Trainer for 2020 by Inland Empire Magazine, and Built the Busy to Bomb Fit Mom exercise system.
She is quickly becoming recognized for her expertise and influence in her field!
Melissa has contributed to numerous publications and has been featured in the Trail Blazer Magazine, and published in the April 2020 edition of Health Magazine. Her approach incorporates personal experience, energy, humor, and charisma.
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