Learn effective methods for gremlins removal. Explore tips and techniques to get rid of gremlins and keep your home free from mischief.
We all have gremlins. Who are they, and why do they make our lives so bad?
This isn’t about our kids, though I’m sure we all have some funny names for them. Gremlins are the negative thoughts that we have that try to make us feel like we’re not good enough. They are sometimes called the inner critic or bad self-talk. No matter what you call them, they are at the very least annoying and for many people completely crippling!
We often do a lot of different things and have a lot of different jobs. Being a good parent, partner, worker, boss, and friend is hard. There’s a voice in our heads that tells us things probably won’t work out anyway when things don’t go as planned. This makes it even harder to play those parts well.
Where do these sounds come from? How can we get rid of them? (Or should we?)
We usually have more than one gremlin, and they generally come from a real or imagined threat we faced in the past.
As a teen, you may have wanted to join a group and learned that you had to act in a certain way to get in. Or maybe something very embarrassing happened to you. Your gremlins are “trying to” keep you safe from rejection and pain in the future.
Voices often make too broad of claims because the threat seems so real. They get interested in our lives when they don’t need to be.
How Can You Stop Gremlins From Getting In The Way?
1) Notice It:
Pay close attention to times when the sounds appear. Is it with certain people? Are you going to try something new? Is it when you’re feeling really brave? What does the voice want to keep you safe from? What does it want to say?
2) Name It:
Say what it is. You could tell yourself, “That’s my perfectionist gremlin” or “That’s the voice in my head that doesn’t want me to be embarrassed.” You could even give it a name. (Mine is called “Roz,” and Elaine’s is called “Prudence.”)
3) Own It:
Understand that having an inner voice making sure you are safe can be very helpful at times. You could even stop and be thankful.
4) Choose:
Check to see if the voice is making things worse or better. You can choose to listen or not. We’ve all had friends and family give us advice that we didn’t ask for or didn’t want, and we chose to ignore it. Don’t listen to the bug if what it says is NOT helpful.
Tell them, “Thanks for sharing, but I’ve got this one covered!” to shut them up. Note: This might not get rid of them, but it can usually give us enough space to move forward and start to get back on track.
You might want to teach your kids some of this “gremlin talk” too. Gremlins start to show up when people are pretty young. Your kids are beginning to build defenses that are helpful but can get in the way of success and moving forward.
Keep in mind that these sounds are a normal part of being human and can help you stay away from real danger. You just need to be smart enough to know when to listen and when to tell them to “mind their own business.”
What Are Saboteurs Or Gremlins?
They’re not bad, gremlins. They look out for you. From when we are kids, they keep us safe from things we don’t understand yet. When we feel scared, confused, unsure, awkward, or embarrassed about something, our Gremlin steps in to protect us. Because of this, some people even see their Gremlin as their inner Warrior.
The fight or flight reaction usually sets off your Gremlin. But did you know there’s more than just run away or fight? Fight, flight, freeze, or fawn is the correct answer. These are some ways they can look:
- Fight: Fight makes you feel like you have to defend yourself or your point of view against other people. During the triangle of disempowerment, you become rigid, may raise your voice, or adopt a “my way or the highway” attitude. You need to be ready for attacks when other people’s thoughts or ideas come up.
- Flight: Sometimes flight doesn’t mean running away. You could try to change the subject instead of giving your view. There are things or people you can avoid. You might shut down when you’re unhappy, when you’re too worried, or when you try to avoid making mistakes by being too perfect.
- Freeze: Freeze needs to get out of here. Because of XYZ or ABC, every path looks dangerous, impossible, or closed to you. You’re frozen. There is no way for you to move.
- Fawn: Fawn likes to make everyone happy. Making sure everyone else is happy and calm will keep you safe. Demands are met even if you’re already busy or the demands go against what you believe in. You put other people’s situations ahead of your own to focus on theirs. You think it’s your job to keep the peace.
In order to keep us safe, these are all our Saboteurs at work. They often feel “on guard” even when there isn’t a real threat, which can be hard to understand and even more limited.
When we feel these things, we might ask ourselves:
- “What am I experiencing?”
- “Why can’t I do what I know I need to do?”
- “Why does everyone else look so calm?”
- Ask yourself, “Why do I do the same things over and over?”
- “Why am I so easy to get along with?”
- “What makes me so mad?”
- “What’s making me so scared?”
- “Why did I not say anything?”
- “Why am I putting the happiness of other people ahead of my own?”
- “Why do I worry about how other people will react?”
- “What, why, why?”
The truth is that your Gremlin has been running your business. It is always on the lookout for possible threats, and if something inside you is always listening for threats, guess what it will find? As well, if that part of you has been your main inner voice for a long time, guess what you’ll think is true?
Why Do We Still Have Gremlins As Adults?
If you were lucky enough to learn how to control your Gremlins as a child or young adult, you would probably be able to look at the world around you with a sense of wonder and possibility as an adult.
But a lot of us don’t learn this. It’s possible that you had a rough youth. Or a very happy childhood, but the way parents thought about raising kids back then was different.
On the other hand, maybe letting your Gremlin take the lead worked for you for a long time! You may have lived or worked in a place where you needed your Gremlin to keep you safe or where a method led by your Gremlin seemed to work.
Most importantly, if you’ve grown up with a Gremlin-led attitude, you probably think that your Gremlin’s view of the world is the only way it is. That being said, you should think about some of your mental models and how they’ve been leading you.