Staying Positive When You’re Taking Criticism

 
Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things. ~ Winston Churchill

I suck at this, even when criticism is truly constructive criticism without any malice I take it badly.  I’ve learned over time to react appropriately, to put on a good face but it always hurts.  Somehow I don’t think I’m unusual in this respect but it’s something I need to work to get better at.  The inspiration for this post occurred recently as someone contacted me to give me some information that probably will make things better for me in the long run.  However the advice felt like criticism in the moment, it impacted my mood and left me annoyed for a few hours.  The more distant I got from the moment, the more I began to understand that the person really was doing a good thing for me.  As a result of this information I’ve made a change that in the end is the right thing to do.

So how do we do it my friends, how to we learn to handle this better?  The reason that criticism hurts so much is that it usually hits one of our internal landmines, one of spots of insecurity.  The trick therefore is to reduce our areas of insecurity and to increase our confidence.  However, we get caught in a vicious loop, at least initially, in the fact that the way to increase confidence is to take risks and we’re never so unconfident as when we’re trying something new.  The secret in all of this however is that it’s a long-term game, sure, stepping out is risky, we’ll likely face criticism in the beginning.  However over time, the more times we try, and the more times we succeed the more confident we become and the fewer insecurities we have.  This is all part of the work we need to do to grow, to be more confident and to have happy days my friends ~ Rev Kane

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