old habits die hard...

I know this. And yet I was reminded of it again today in yoga class. Deralyn talked to us about quieting those voices in our head that judge us. Specifically for our yoga class she encouraged us to hush those voices that said, "You could do this last week or yesterday, why can't you do it today?" or "You've never been able to do headstand, what makes you think you can do it now?" (Don't worry...I didn't attempt it!)
Anyway, as I left yoga I kept hearing Deralyn's words in my head (a whole new set of voices, right?! Awesome!) and I thought a lot about those voices - the judging voices. We all have them, if we're honest with ourselves. They are the ones that tell us we're not good enough or fast enough or nice enough or pretty enough or smart enough or, well, you get the picture. They are the voices that ridicule our attempts to try something new if we don't nail it the first time around. The voices that convince us that we don't deserve whatever it is that we've earned or received quite miraculously.
I think over time we can quiet these voices. I've done it with some of the voices that judge me. It took a lot of work...and they try to sneak back into my head every now and then. They start as a whisper and if I'm on top of things they never become louder than an inside voice. If I'm distracted or feeling weak in general, they can become a full-fledged shout...not helpful!
But with other voices, I worry that I'll always hear them...that I'll always be my worst critic, that I'll always expect too much of myself, that I'll never think I've done enough for the people and places and communities that I love, that I'll never live up to others' expectations of me. Usually I can find a way to shut them up. But from time to time, I just have to pause and listen and say, "Really, you are NOT being helpful." So even though I left yoga more pensive than uplifted today, maybe that's a good thing. Perhaps becoming more aware of letting go of the voices on the yoga mat will trickle over into other areas of my life...