Several weeks ago I read an article by Eduardo Scheffler Zawadzki on Entrepreneur entitled Nick Cave and the secret to silencing the voice of doubt. While I am not familiar with Nick Cave, I found it interesting that someone with popularity and success can still struggle with fear and doubt. If someone who is in the limelight struggles with self-doubt, then we should not be surprised when it happens to us.
While I suggest reading the entire article, there are a few select quotes I’d like to highlight.
“In his little text Nick Cave explains that this voice [of doubt] is the true enemy of aspiration. A cruel command that orders us to distance ourselves from a possible better version of ourselves. Without realizing it, many of us fall for their game and, scared, we give up.”
“We constantly judge ourselves, we disqualify ourselves, we scoff at our efforts. We deny our little achievements and, without help from anyone else, we managed to fall apart.”
And finally, my favorite quote from the article:
“If you allow the battle to be won by your homunculus, if you surrender to bitter self-criticism, you run the risk of existing defeated and frustrated, eternally punishing yourself with dislikes like a little tyrant. But if you believe in yourself, if you have the courage to fight against the dark echoes of doubt that you engender, sooner or later you will realize that in the process you have created something unique, beautiful and valuable.”
The word ‘homunculus’, translated literally as ‘little man’ from Latin, means a fully-formed tiny human being. Cave refers to the ‘homunculus’ as the inner voice in our heads that repeatedly tells us we’re not good enough. We need to fight that ‘homunculus’ within each of us: stand up to the inner voice of criticism.