The following talk was given at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California.

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The thing. So today I'm going to continue on this topic of the inner critic and there's a number of different ways we can define the inner critic, but I'm influenced by

Rapportbea when he talks about it and he says it's like almost like a sub-personality inside of us and I'm saying that not being a psychologist so we don't

have to read any psychological meaning into that just you know common everyday usage.

But it's this voice that's like,

maybe it's a voice, it's a constellation of experiences

that's constantly putting us down, belittling us, this voice of

negativity that's blaming ourselves and nagging us and maybe it's accompanied with this sense of shame,

shame for what we are or how we are or who we are and it has this climate of harshness and not only that when part of the way that we might

even know that it's there is there's this feeling of inadequacy I I'm not enough. Whatever I'm doing it's not enough or I'm not

worthy or who I am as a living being is inadequate, not enough in some kind of way.

Yeah, oh, so much pain and Duka

that can be wrapped up in this structure, we'll say.

So for the guided meditation, like I did yesterday,

I'm going to do one that's not the usual guide of meditation that we find in Vipasana,

retreats or instructions.

It's not that general one, but to give myself some credibility I want to say that I've learned this from Sharon Salzburg somebody who is you know

She's a very influential figure here in the Tarvada Buddhism in the contemporary west.

And part of the reason why I'm choosing this type of a guided meditation is

because it kind of like usurps power from the thinking mind.

And the inner critic, you know, kind of co-ops of thinking mind.

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