Just recently one of my brave, brave students took her intuitive paintings home and showed them to her dad.

She was generous enough to share the interchange with me and I thought it would be helpful to share it with all of you.

Here's a brief transcript of their conversation:

My student: "Hey dad, I'm taking this cool painting class in Oakland and I wanted you to see something that I created there.

Her Dad: "What is this? I don't understand it? Is this a turnip?"

My Student: "No Dad. Can't you see? It's my radical self acceptance!"

Her Dad: "Hmmmph... Well, when are you going to take a REAL art class?"

My Student: " Oh dad, you are such a funny guy!! Why would I ever want to get something as boring as formal art training??"

In my intuitive painting classes I always encourage my students to be careful about what they do with their paintings once they take them home and particularly about who they show them to.

Once you are in my studio there is a very specific parameter set about making comments on each others work, which is that we DON'T. Make comments, that is. AT ALL.

This creates an atmosphere where people can relax and not worry about things like external approval, judgment, and competition. All the things that can really put a major damper on your creative freedom and enthusiasm.

But the rest of the world outside of my studio is not yet savvy to this particular approach and in fact think that they are supposed to comment on your work.

They  think that they need to have some kind of an opinion either positive or negative. They don't know any other way to relate to a piece of artwork.

Which puts the artist in a very vulnerable position because those comments always create an impact and it's usually not a helpful one.

So I suggest to my students that they take care about who gets to see their stuff, reminding them that they don't really have to expose it to anyone and that if they do decide to open themselves up to their friends and family, it's OK to be clear about what kind of response they do want.

Presenting your paintings to another person is a great opportunity to practice having boundaries.

It's a chance to try on for size saying some potentially scary things like: "Yes, I took a painting class and what I worked on is private and I don't feel quite ready for anyone to see it just yet."

And making clear requests, like: "I would appreciate it if when you looked at my painting that you please not make any judgments about it because I'm still feeling tender and vulnerable. I would really love it if you could just be happy for me that I gave myself the chance to be creative."

But of course, sometimes you just need to throw caution to the winds and put your work out there knowing that you can find a way to creatively deal with any response you might get!

Which is exactly what this woman did by risking showing her painting to her dad. I just loved how my student was able to stick to her guns in this conversation and not get thrown off by her dad's response.

It was also a great example about how to pretty effectively deal with your own judging mind which her dad so graciously illustrated by taking on the role of a superb outer fault-finder.

This conversation with her dad could just as easily have been a conversation with her own inner critic. And in fact, some version of her dad's responses are probably something that we have all experienced and internalized at some point in our lives.

Which is why we need skillful ways to deal with those voices whether they are in our heads or in our face.

So I've outlined some things that I learned about dealing with that cranky part of our inner landscape from my students interchange with her dad.

1.) It's  much harder for the critic to get a purchase on you if you approach your creative work with a sense of positive enthusiasm.

But how, of course, do you do that especially if the disapproving part of your psyche has gone into overdrive and has your creativity in a serious choke hold?

One of the things I notice with my painting students ( and of course, with myself) is that they are always operating on two different channels when they are creating. There is the left brain channel which is where all the chatter and stories and the not so flattering commentary about what they are doing is coming from.

And then there is the right brain channel which is related to the direct here and now, in your body, felt experience of the creative process.

And it is the right brain channel that allows you to tap into where you are the most authentically and creatively alive.

You can think that what you are creating is awful or bad or not good enough and at the same time you can have a deeply felt, present time experience where you are enjoying the process of creation immensely.

So it's all about where you are focusing your attention.

Do you want to spend your time listening to an endlessly boring string of negative, disparaging criticism or simply allow yourself to have a good time?

You do get to choose.

2.) The critic doesn't really know what it is talking about. So always be suspicious of anything it tells you.

"Is this a turnip?" I mean... come on... can't you do any better than that, Mr. Backseat Driver Of The Creative Process? If you're going to criticize someone's sincere creative effort at least come up with something well thought out that has some vague reference to the thing your criticizing.

But no, no, no... the inner " Always Up For A Potshot" critic is not bound by any such rules or conventions. The truth of it is... it makes things up... all the time. We get into trouble when we take what it says to us as the gospel truth but all it wants to do is to find something that we will react to.

Essentially it's fishing for things that will make us jump up and down and get us totally distracted from actually creating.

Our job is to be a smart little creative fishy and not bite the bait.

3.) Don't allow the critic to define you. Affirm your own creative efforts every chance you get.

You get to set the terms and parameters around your creative work. Always. If the judging mind says "turnip" and you say "radical self acceptance" you are the one that has the last and final and only word on the subject.

Dance around singing made up songs about radical self acceptance.  Shout it from the rooftops.  Paint it in four foot high red letters on butcher paper and hang it on your living room wall.

4.) Don't ever, ever, EVER take it seriously.

It's always a good policy to treat that part of your mind like you would your dear, old, clueless dad. Which means with a sense of humor, a gentle eyeroll and a firm yet loving boundary.

Have you ever been asked the question " If you could have a superpower, what would it be?"

Well, it seems like I already have one although it's not one that you ever see in the Marvel Comic books.

Nor is it one that I would have necessarily chosen.

My weird superpower seems to be that I have the ability to make people cry.

It's not like I'm mean or anything. I don't go around pinching them hard or calling them bad names. And it's not really that I MAKE them cry. They just find themselves crying whenever they are hanging out with me.

This is something that I have never set OUT to do. It's not on my agenda, and it's not something that I plan for.

Although during all the many years that I was in private practice as a psychotherapist having someone cry during a session was always seen as a good thing.

Now what, you may be asking, DO I do which seems to facilitate this outpouring of weepiness. I think that my real gift is not actually making people cry. That is just a by product.

I think the gift I was given to help make the world a better place ( and I think that all of our innate gifts serve that function) is that I know how to put my own concerns and opinions aside for a while  and give people my undivided, heartfelt, gently compassionate, non-judging attention. I make them feel safe. And seen. And like they are very important.

In other words... I really know how to listen to someone.

I have built my intuitive painting empire on this particular talent. I love listening to people. I am totally fascinated and intrigued by what goes on inside of people's souls and minds. And my heart always goes out to their pain and suffering as well as being able to jump up and down in celebration of their triumphs and their joys.

I enjoy listening. And listening deeply. I can get inside of someone's experience and understand what they are going through, beam on them and shower them with acceptance, with no effort at all. For me it's not a big deal.

For a long time, I never really thought much about it. I had the attitude that if I could do it then it must be something ANYONE could do. I had a hard time valuing this quality as anything special.

It only became obvious to me that it WAS something special when people would continually remark upon my ability.

Sometimes they would tell me with an air of incredulousness, more rarely with an edge of resentment and other times it would come across with a feeling of gratitude.

They would say things like "Wow. That's amazing! How do you DO that? How do you be so non-judgmental and seem really get where the other person is coming from? How are you able to be so incredibly empathetic?"

And I would look at them and say "Huh???" It's kind of like asking somebody "How do you breathe?" or "How do you make your heart beat?"

I also started to get an even bigger clue when I discovered that people were willing to pay me money to do this.

Once I had a job as a bookkeeper. Don't even ASK how that ever happened. And I lasted all of two weeks before I was ignominiously fired. So, no.  Bookkeeping or anything to do with numbers and keeping track of small pieces of paper?  Definitely NOT one of my superpowers.

It helps to know what you are NOT good at. That's a very good start. But you also need to eventually identify your superpower. Because EVERYONE has a superpower. No one has been left out of the superpower club.

Everyone has a gift that is precious and needed by friends, family and community. Everyone has a genius, an expertise, an offering, a generous capability that is part of your basic makeup that helps, heals and inspires anyone who comes in contact with you.

I can hear some of the naysayers in the crowd now saying things like "Maybe you THINK everyone has a superpower, but not me. There's nothing about me that is particularly worthy or significant."

And I'm here to tell you... in the nicest way possible... that  you are dead wrong!! If you are alive and breathing that means you have something precious and wondrous to share with the world.

So if you're really not sure what it is, how DO you discover this inborn brilliance that is part of your birthright as a human being?

The first way to find out is to come right out and ASK people who know you to tell you what they love about you. Or if that's too scary, just notice the nice things that people in your life already say about you.

Recognizing where your talents lie is patently and often glaringly obvious to people outside of you, but not so much TO you. Because that would mean you would have to value yourself.

The second way is to ask yourself the question "What is easy for you? What do you enjoy doing so much that you can't help but do it? That you would do no matter what? That you can't STOP yourself from doing, even if you tried? What expresses itself so naturally and is so easy peasy that you take it for granted?"

Because one of the conflicts that folks have around claiming their superpower is the belief that it has to be something difficult to be worthwhile.  We all carry remnants of some Puritan ethic that tells us our purpose has to be something HARD. Something that you STRUGGLE with. Something that is always a bit out of your reach.

And I am here, once again,  to say to you: No, no, NO..... your purpose on this planet is meant to flow out of you like a clear, cascading, mountain stream.

Which doesn't mean that you might not want to spend time and energy developing it. I had lots of basic raw material around empathy and compassion to begin with but gained an enormous amount by putting myself in situations where I could be inspired and guided by others to take this nascent gift and turn it into something beautifully polished and skilled.

But developing it was something that was fun for me. I enjoyed the process of growing my empathetic, listening skills. It most often felt like play. Which is another reason I had a hard time taking it seriously. Because how could something that I experienced as so natural and so much fun be a POWER of any sort?

But it was. And still is. And the same is true for you.

So, if you already know what your superpower is, let it shine. Give it some room to breathe and LOTS of room to express itself. And watch how happy doing that makes you and those who have the great good fortune of being part of your life.

And if you don't yet have a name for it? If you're too scared or ashamed to admit that you might have something of great value to give to the world? First of all, be gentle with yourself. Try to remember that it's OK to ask for help around this.

And finally, it doesn't REALLY matter whether or not you ever call it anything. Because your gift is pouring out of you all the time ANYWAY.

It would just be nice if you got to feel really good about yourself and to enjoy it as much as everyone else.