By: Leigh DeBord
“What is more important to me than praise or being liked in this situation?” This is the fifth principle in unhooking from praise and criticism in Tara Mohr’s book Playing Big. Asking ourselves this question is pivotal to discovering and living out our command purpose. It is also a critical question to ask ourselves when we are trying to harmonize an existence with our inner critic.
When we are in the military, we are leaders – leaders who constantly take calculated risks and make hard decisions. We spend years developing and testing our leadership skills to be confident in our ability to make quick decisions under pressure in ambiguous and high stakes environments. In our military roles, we are masters of quieting, or in some cases, ignoring our inner critic. We often don’t have the time to worry about what our soldiers, peers, or bosses think of our decisions, and we are always able to default to the strength of our mission and purpose of service. We are mission and execution driven, task oriented, and confident we have trained and prepared to deliver the intended outcome. With that confidence, we strike a balance between ourselves and our inner critic in these roles.
When transitioning into the civilian world and corporate America, many of us are flooded with self-doubt and begin questioning our abilities. We spend a lot of time and energy trying to please others and wonder what they will think of our decisions. We want affirmation and confirmation that we are doing the right things and on the right path. We want others to validate our existence in the workplace. We start questioning the battle tested confidence, decision making, and leadership skills we relied on for success and survival. Our inner critic appears louder and more confident than we ever remember. Tara Mohr’s book is an excellent guide to restoring the harmony in our lives between our true self and our inner critic.
What is the inner critic? Tara Mohr defines the inner critic as the voice of “not-me.” It is the harsh, rude, binary voice in our heads that masquerades as the voice of reason and says, “you aren’t ready yet – you don’t have the qualifications.” It is the voice of body-perfectionism, the irrational but persistent broken record, the one-two punch that may take inspiration from critical people in your life. We all have an inner-critic. It is designed to keep us safe. Just like we have an inner critic, we also have an inner mentor. Who is our inner mentor? Our inner mentor is an imagined version of an older, wiser, more authentic version of ourselves. She is a counter to the inner critic – she is the vision of who you want to be in the future.
In the third chapter Tara talks about fear. She references the Hebrew Bible, which uses two different words for fear. The first is pachad – the over-reactive, irrational fear that stems from worries about what could happen and the worst case scenarios we imagine. The second is yirah, and it has three meanings. The first is the feeling that overcomes us when we inhabit a larger space than we are used to. The second is the feeling we experience when we suddenly come into possession of considerably more energy than we had before. The third is what we feel in the presence of the divine. Tara relates the fear felt associated with the inner critic as pachad and the fear associated with the inner mentor as yirah. When we are working toward living in our purpose, it requires us to move away from pachad and lean into yirah.
The fourth chapter focuses on unhooking from praise and criticism. Praise can make us reliant on others to validate our “goodness,” and criticism can make us fear taking risks. Tara outlines five principles to unhook from praise and criticism, which begins with reframing how we view feedback. Feedback doesn’t tell you about you, it tells you about the person giving the feedback. By incorporating feedback that’s strategically useful, and letting the rest go, we can unhook from the praise and criticism that accompanies playing big.
After defining the inner critic, the inner mentor, understanding fear, and outlining how to unhook from praise, Tara Mohr explains the pitfalls preventing us from playing bigger and transitions into antidotes for undermining ourselves which include: leaping, communicating with power, and recognizing our callings.
Tara Mohr says, “Being a change agent requires trusting the voice of your inner mentor, not your inner critic; moving forward despite your fears; letting go of attachment to praise and criticism; taking leaps; getting out of good-student mode and into a mode of leadership. It requires communicating without diminishing yourself, respecting and pursuing your callings, and supporting your aims wisely and through self-care.”
Command Purpose envisions a world where veteran women are empowered to make confident and informed choices and assume positions as leaders, mentors, and pillars in society. Transformational leaders have vision and make a lasting impact. This book has the power to take you to the next level and it provides practical exercises and a framework to help you find your true self and reach your full potential.