“I am my own worst critic.”

“No one is harder on me than me.”

“I beat myself up for mistakes.”

I hear this all the time from CEOs when we talk about mistakes, errors in judgment that they have made. Can we just stop? Self-criticism without a dose of understanding is the worst thing you can do to yourself.

It’s important to be self-aware. You have to be willing to reflect on the actions you take. But constantly criticizing yourself hurts you and it hurts your company. Here’s why:

• When you constantly criticize yourself, you begin to lose confidence in yourself. If you are too critical of past action then you won’t take any risks or make key decisions because you’re afraid of failing again. This results in missed opportunities.
• Your organization loses confidence in you when you won’t take action.
• You begin to create a culture of blame in the organization. Some leaders who criticize themselves then find it easy to blame others. It’s a recipe for the toxic workplace.
• Negative self-talk hurts your mental and emotional well-being. It’s hard enough being a CEO without focusing on your flaws and feelings of inadequacy. It accelerates the road to burnout. You don’t need to be perfect, says author Tom Yorton.

Let’s look at it from the other side. If you are a self-confident leader with a good (not inflated) self-image, you are more likely to inspire and motivate the people on your team. If they know they can take a risk without being criticized when it does not work perfectly, they are more likely to grow and help your company succeed.

It’s crucial that you understand the difference between being self-aware and being self-critical. Being self-aware means you can recognize your strengths and weaknesses and adjust when you need to. Self-criticism is that voice in your head saying you’ll never be good enough because you always fail. There are many ways to turn off this critical voice.

The self-talk in your head ought to be, “I’m not perfect. This job can be difficult. But I’ve got the skills to lead. I’ve got a great team backing me up. I am going to make mistakes, but so what? I will learn from them and get better.”