His Only Desire is Criticism

Canoes, Lake Mohegan NY. Sometimes I post something and take it down a few hours later. It's not embarrassment, or changing my mind... it's realizing that the voice that was speaking wasn't my own. It was the Critical Parent. Back in 1980, I saw a therapist for the first time. It was a year after Dad died of cancer, and Mom thought it would help. The therapist taught me a model called Transactional Analysis (TA). I absorbed it fully, the way the music you heard at 14 remains your favorite forever (for the record: Michael Jackson Off the Wall, AC/DC Back in Black, and ELO Out of the Blue). TA goes like this: You have three aspects to your mind: The Parent, the Adult, and the Child. The Parent is split into two parts: The Critical Parent and the Nurturing Parent. When your mind is working poorly, the Critical Parent is in control, and the Adult doesn't shut him down, so the Child feels terrible. When the Critical Parent takes over, he says, "...nobody practices 'photography' at an…