The Inner Critic doesn’t exist – and we shall realise this if we interpret ‘neutral information’ as exactly that: neutral.
It’s our Unconscious habits and conditioned self-judgements that cause us to interpret neutral information as critical, self-criticising, or unfriendly, self-denying, self-sabotaging or even hostile.
This is understandable, but a trap we can empower ourselves to avoid.
So whilst The Inner Critic doesn’t exist, we might say that the ‘Self-Criticising Interpreter ’ does, whenever we are in a state of self-judgement.
It’s just a habit of how we interpret our thoughts, but for most people, probably a pretty ingrained one.