The Gremlin

OK, last week I told you about the Genius so this week we'll learn about The Gremlin. You are probably more familiar with The Gremlin than you are with The Genius. The Gremlin is the critical voice in you. The Gremlin tells you what it thinks you’re doing wrong and tries to make you feel guilty.

As we try to get more comfortable with asking our Genius for help or answers to our life problems, The Gremlin doesn't like it. So, it usually answers first--and often quite loudly--hoping you will think it's the Genius and do what it says. But, you'll know it’s The Gremlin answering, if you are feeling afraid, worried, angry or guilty.

The way to neutralize the criticism from The Gremlin is to not judge that part of you. Don't judge the critical part of yourself and soon it will grow weaker because you aren't giving it focus and attention. And, try giving it another function besides being critical of you. ie--instead of seeing it as critical, try to learn from it. If it tells you something "bad" about yourself, evaluate what it's criticizing and change that behavior before it becomes worse. Use its feedback constructively rather than assuming that the criticism is correct.


We are always choosing between living our life from the perspective of The Genius or The Gremlin. And, remember, when you’re held hostage by The Gremlin, you can’t be enjoying the freedom that The Genius offers.

You can either learn how to make the most out of the rest of your life or you can have anger, fear, worry and guilt, but you can’t have both. Luckily, the choice is yours.

As you start listening to The Gremlin less often, it won’t like it very much so it will crank up the volume on the anger, fear, worry and guilt. But, this is a good sign, because once you start feeling all those feelings more often you will know to just keep with it because things are about to change and The Gremlin is about to give up ground. Or, maybe disappear altogether.

Any anger you are carrying in you will act as a magnet and draw more anger to you. And, anger, fear, worry and guilt keep us from having what we want in life. So, getting rid of the anger is a step toward having more Genius in our life.

Assuming you’d rather live life with The Genius than The Gremlin, you’ll need to learn a way to minimize The Gremlin. One way to do that is by using what I call the “Getting Rid Of The Mad” list. I'll share the this technique with you in next week's post.

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Genius or Gremlin? Which will you choose?

I wasn’t getting what I wanted out of life and since I Love To Give Advice, I decided to take a look at my life to see if I could give myself some advice. One of the things I discovered is that we have two main parts of ourselves: The Genius and The Gremlin. This week, I'll tell you about The Genius, next week I'll outline The Gremlin.

I define GENIUS as: the best of who we are. The smart, intuitive, most all knowing part of ourselves. Here are some characteristics of The Genius:


· The Genius can actually bring your ideas, and dreams from your inner world into your outer world where you can experience them with your physical senses.
· The Genius wants you to have whatever you want.
· The Genius’ response is always peaceful. It feels “right” or sometimes like you’ve known the answer all along.
· The Genius does not think in terms we are used to and it will help us grow if we are willing to ask it to help us. It brings you information from sources other than those that can be detected by our physical senses. By getting quiet and listening to your thoughts and feelings, you can tap into a much larger spectrum of information that is available to you.
· Your Genius is the source of all that you have in your life—many of us think that our jobs or other people are our source, but that is not the case.
· Your Genius makes sure that everyone wins. If it feels like a win-win situation, it’s probably from your Genius.
· Your Genius won’t let anything leave your life if you really need it. It always makes sure something better comes along to replace what leaves your life. But, sometimes things or people leave our life, and the better thing hasn’t arrived yet. When that happens we need to let ourselves trust that something better is on the way to us.
· Your Genius is always with you, loving and guiding you. If you want something, ask The Genius for it and then be willing to accept it when it comes and the form in which it comes.
· Your Genius is always watching over you. It pays attention to our attitudes and makes sure that we’re developed enough to have what we want. Sometimes we say we want something, but are unconsciously afraid to have it. The Genius doesn’t want us to be afraid. So, it will not bring what we’re asking for until our fear shifts and we have become more open to have the thing we’re asking for.

If we all lived our lives with a sense of fairness, trying to get along with others and listening to our Genius, society would be entirely different.

Only you can know what direction is best for you to go in. What works for others might not work for you so stop trying to live your life in the way others think is best.

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Therapy vs Advice

8/10/08 -
Have you ever heard that old light bulb joke?

Q: "How many therapists does it take to change a light bulb?" A: Only one, but the light bulb has to really want to change".

The answer to that joke is a true statement about therapy. People have to really want to change in order for therapy to be successful. And, usually change takes awhile.

When I was in graduate school, they wanted to teach us how long it takes to change. So, we were instructed to learn to tie our shoelaces the opposite way from how we were used to tying them. (This, of course, was back in the day when shoes HAD laces and people DID tie them). It took me about six weeks to tie my shoelaces differently.

If something as simple as shoe laces takes six weeks, think how long it takes for us to change a maladaptive behavior we've had for years. So, with therapy, you have to be willing to work, to change and for it to take time.

I'm not sure that's necessarily true with advice giving. You have a problem and we talk about it. I give you some advice and you either take it or you don't. If you decide to follow my advice, there's a good chance that either all or part of your situation will change and it might not take so long.

Try asking for advice. It might just make a difference in your life.

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