Reacting
to criticism
So often we are immobilized by the slightest
criticism. We treat it like an emergency, and
defend ourselves as if we were in a battle.
When we react to criticism with a knee-jerk,
defensive response, it hurts. We feel attacked,
and we have a need to defend or to offer a counter
criticism. We fill our minds with angry or hurtful
thoughts directed at ourselves or at the person
who is being critical. All this reaction takes an
enormous amount of mental energy.
An incredibly useful exercise is to agree with
criticism directed toward you. I'm not talking
about turning into a doormat or ruining your
self-esteem by believing all negativity that comes
in your direction. There are many times when
simply agreeing with criticism defuses the
situation, satisfies a person's need to express a
point of view, offers you a chance to learn
something about yourself by seeing a grain of
truth in another position, and, perhaps most
important, provides you an opportunity to remain
calm.
One of the first times I consciously agreed with
criticism directed toward me was many years ago
when a devotee said to me, "Sometimes you talk too
much." I remember feeling momentarily hurt before
deciding to agree. I responded by saying, "You're
right, I do talk too much sometimes." In agreeing
with him, I was able to see that he had a good
point. I often do talk too much! What's more, my
non-defensive reaction helped him to relax.
Reacting to criticism never makes the criticism go
away. In fact, negative reactions to criticism
often convince the person doing the criticizing
that they are accurate in their assessment of you.