What Kind of INNER Mean Girl Do You Have?

What we found in our 5 years of research, work with 30,000 women and girls around the globe, across socio-economic, professional and cultural diversity is:

While the idea of the inner critic isn’t new, how it works within women and girls is specific. Every one of us has these internal forces, even those who appear the strongest, smartest and most successful. It’s workings are often invisible, yet the impact on our lives and overall mental, emotional and physical wellbeing are significant.

This invisible force drives our thoughts, feelings, actions, as well as our big and small choices, in sabotaging ways. We call this our “Inner Mean Girl” because she feels personal, she knows how to hit you right where it hurts, and she will make you stop trusting yourself.  While she isn’t always mean, she is always bullying and pressuring us in ways that don’t serve or support us.

We also found that taking a creative, curious, playful approach gets us past our heads (where the inner mean girl rules), and into our hearts, bodies and spirits where our inner wisdom lives.  

So the archetypes, while playful, give us a powerful, insightful way to start observing, understanding and relating to these parts of ourselves calling for our attention.

Here’s a few samples of real Inner Mean Girls, brought to life by myself and the women, educators, therapists and practioners we’ve trained in this methodology over the past decade.

A short note from Christine Arylo, co-creators of the Reform Your Inner Mean Girl™ Methodology – About the Magic that Makes this Approach So Powerful for Women & Girls 

What we have noticed in the decade plus that we’ve worked with women and girls on 6 continents to break their self-sabotaging habits and transform their thoughts, emotions, actions, and feelings from self-criticism, self-doubt, and self-sabotage into self-empowerment, self-compassion, and self-care is this…

Even though this approach leads women into deeper transformative work that brings them face-to-face with their own self-judgments, limitations and sabotage, women actually LOVE doing the work. That is the magic of the Inner Mean Girl™ Reform School method. It gives women access to their dark sides and to the emotions, feelings, and stories that can be tremendously difficult to be with, all by using a powerful mix of play, humor, creativity, and self-inquiry.

And because this process is specifically designed just for women, as women see the experiences of other women they learn they aren’t the only ones with negative thoughts and feelings of inadequacy.

As a result, their emotions of shame, fear, anxiety, judgment, anger, and sadness transform; the walls of isolation come down; and women begin to heal wounds that have been running them into unhealthy situations, choices, habits, and relationships for years. Women are profoundly affected by this work in ways that other modalities alone haven’t been able to get to.

We’ve tested the Reform Your Inner Mean Girl Reform with women of all ages, from college students to women well into their 60s, and it continues to work. We’ve tested this approach with girls as young as 8, and have counseled mothers on how, as they reform their Inner Mean Girls, they can help their daughters deal with theirs (or even give their daughters preventative care so the Inner Mean Girl voice never develops into more than a mere whisper!).

We created the Inner Mean Girl quiz to give you a first step in gaining language for this invisible part that is influencing your thoughts, emotions and actions. It’s insight and brings levity and playfulness so we actually want to know this part better.

We continue to use this methodology with everyone from: the executive leaders and high level professionals we work with, who while strong and smart, still have these sabotaging forces within them… with the young emerging leaders, professionals and change makers – in high school, college and early to mid career – who are influenced by a system that either makes them doubt themselves or defend themselves … and with organizations, educators, parents and practicioners who are leading the way to bring the tools for wellbeing and wise decision making into our educational systems.

We invite you to take this self-assessment + then start to observe yourself like a curious, investigative reporter. (link below)

Then try out the Reform Your Inner Mean Girl 7-step process in the book (learn more here)

And if you like us have a passion for working with the next generation of leaders and the young ones who have not yet forgotten how to trust their inner wisdom and intuition completely, connect with us through our podcasts or email support@innermeangirl.com 

With heart,