Husband and wife authors Neal Allen and Anne Lamott will present a book talk and signing of Allen’s book “Better Days: Tame Your Inner Critic,” 6 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 12 at Chaucer’s Books, 3321 State St., Santa Barbara.

Lamott, who is New York Times bestselling author of “Bird By Bird,” wrote the forward to Allen’s book.

In “Better Days: Tame Your Inner Critic,” Allen, a writer and spiritual coach, teaches readers a new method for quieting the inner critic.

The book poses the question: What if your superego has it wrong? That snarky little bully in your head; you’ve lived under its weight for decades hearing things like:

I’m a fraud, I’m lazy. I need to work harder. I need to be tougher, funnier, calmer. I need to be perfect. I need to hide who I really am.

Allen’s book examines a critical, yet often ignored, aspect of the human psyche — the superego. Building on Freud’s idea that the superego necessarily forms a person’s moral conscience, Allen explains how this voice in your head develops in childhood as a survival mechanism, but when no longer needed for protection, camps out in your mind like a personal parasite.

Through simple and exercises and explorations, Allen leads readers into meeting, confronting, and ultimately quieting one’s own inner critic.

By shedding the burden of the superego, Allen says, a person can overcome tired patterns of reward and punishment, reduce harmful self-talk, and ultimately clear a space for a gentler, more peaceful life.

Allen, whose chief interest is removing obstacles of the ego, also wrote “Shapes of Truth: Discover God Inside You” (self-published, 2021).

A former journalist and corporate executive, he earned master’s degrees in political science and eastern classics.

Lamott is the author of several best-sellers. Her seven novels include “Rosie and Imperfect Birds.” Her 12 nonfiction works include “Bird by Bird,” “Operating Instructions,” “Help Thanks Wow,” and most recently, Dusk Night Dawn.”

Allen and Lamott live in Northern California.