Criticism and disapproval are things we all face at some point in our lives. But nobody ever really teaches us how to deal with it in a way that allows that feedback to enhance our lives instead of destroying our self-esteem. Criticism can be a sign that we have yet to live up to other’s expectations in some way. Receiving criticism will naturally trigger your stress response. That response gears us up, ready to do something about it. Rejection and loneliness continue to be a big threat to our health.
Lets understand how to deal with criticism:
People pleasing:
People-pleasing is a pattern of behavior in which you consistently prioritize others over yourself, even to the detriment of your own health and well-being. It can make us feel the inability to express our needs, likes, and dislikes and unable to hold boundaries or even keep ourselves safe. If we grow up in an environment in which it is not safe to disagree or express difference, if disapproval is expressed in rage or contempt, then as children we learn how to survive that environment. Keeping other people happy becomes a survival skill that we hone and perfect throughout our childhood.
The tasks of dealing with criticism are:
- Building up the ability to tolerate the criticism that could be helpful and use it to your advantage while maintaining a sense of self-worth.
- Being open to learning from negative feedback could help you make progress.
- Learning to let go of criticism that reflects the values of someone else rather than your own.
- Getting clarity on which opinions matter the most to you and why, so that it becomes easier to know when to reflect and learn and when to let go and move on.
Understanding people:
Understanding that people tend to criticize others based on their own rules for living. We want everyone’s approval. If everyone is unique with their ideas and views, then we simply cannot always please them. Most people who are extremely critical of others are also quite critical of themselves. Humans, too, have a tendency to think egocentrically. This can manifest as our insistence that others adhere to the same ideals and regulations that we have established for ourselves.
Context is everything, but we don’t always have access to it. When we don’t have that context, it is much harder to see the criticism for what it is- one person’s idea that is wrapped up in their own experiences. The natural instinct is to take on the criticism as a factual statement that says something about who we are and to start questioning our own self-worth.
Nurturing self-worth:
Not all criticism is bad. When feedback focuses on a specific behavior, we tend to feel guilty, which prompts us to correct our mistakes to repair the relationship. When criticism attacks our personality and our sense of worth as a person, we tend to feel that in the form of shame. Shame triggers our threat system in such a way that it can feel like someone held a match to all our emotions.
Being able to experience shame and getting back from it without losing your sense of self-worth involves:
- Understand what triggers shame for you.
- Reality-checking the criticism and all the judgments that follow. Whether it comes from someone else or inside your own head, judgments and opinions are not facts. They are narratives and stories in mind that can significantly change our experience of the world.
- Minding what you say: A harsh criticism can leave you feeling winded, and you then spend the next few hours rehearsing it again in your head.
- Talking about shame itself: reaching out to someone and sharing our experiences who can listen with empathy helps us to leave shame behind and move on.
Understanding you:
Living the life you want to live in the face of criticism means getting clear on
- The opinions that truly matter to you and why:
The list of whose opinions truly matter needs to be small. It is also worth acknowledging who matters does not mean it is your responsibility to please them. It just means you are willing to listen to their feedback, even when it is not praise, because you know it is likely to be honest and helpful.
- Why you do what you do:
When the way we are living is out of line with our values and what matters most, life stops feeling meaningful. Understanding the kind of person you want to be, how you want to live and contribute to the world. Then it becomes much easier to choose which criticism to take on and which ones to let go.
- Where those familiar critical voices are really coming from:
Recognizing that we learned that way of speaking to ourselves helps us acknowledge that we can re-learn a new internal dialogue that serves us better.
Learning to deal with criticism and disapproval in a healthy way is a crucial life skill. We are built to care what others think of us, so telling ourselves that we don’t care is not the answer. Even the anticipation of criticism or disapproval can be enough to cause paralysis in our ability to strive for things that matter the most to us.
Reminding yourself that being imperfect, making mistakes, or failing is all part of being human. Nurturing your self-worth and resilience to shame is both possible and potentially life-altering. Building resilience to shame does not mean you never feel it. Instead, it means you learn how to dust yourself off and get back up.