I was taught to be powerless by my parents and other adults in my life. I internalized that process and it became my inner critic. Some parts of it are true, though. I am powerless to change how other people feel or think. I can only control my reactions to those things. I can try to persuade them, but I can't jump into their head and flip the switch.

I've slowly been working on allowing myself to do things I wasn't allowed to before, like write poetry about my life. I think self-love and self-care play into it a bit.