To Be or Not To Be

A little kingdom I possess,
Where thoughts and feelings dwell;
And very hard the task I find
Of governing it well.
~ Louisa May Alcott

...that more or less describes my situation!

~A Wise Man Said~

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
~ Aristotle
Thursday, March 21, 2019
 

I had an experience a few days ago that has left me feeling very low. It has made me wonder about the ideal balance between criticism and praise. God knows I am guilty of tilting toward the former…but being a recipient of the same medicine has made me realise how bitter it can taste. I guess I, like most people, thought that I was deserving of at least some praise, and maybe I wasn’t. The reason I might have given only criticism and no praise, if I did, is because I felt there was nothing praiseworthy about something… but whenever I have found something to be praiseworthy I have always tried to convey it, or so I hope? Along with my criticisms. So one conclusion could be that there was nothing praiseworthy about what I did.
Assuming there was something remotely praiseworthy and assuming the concerned person knew that there was something, what could their sole focus on criticism be motivated by? I can only imagine that with all good intention they wanted me to focus on improvement rather than letting me get ahead of myself. The truth is though that had they given me even a little bit of praise and encouragement, I would have found their criticism so much easier to bear or digest or assimilate. I feel like I would have felt motivated to do better… to improve… to show that I was capable of a lot more…to aspire to more of their praise. But now… I feel… what for? Do better for what? To be told I had a long way to go? Improve for what…. To hear I could do even better? To aspire to what… more criticism?
I have always aimed to do well anything that I set out to do. If I am bad at something I will generally not do it—unless it’s something like housework and there’s no getting around it. But when it comes to anything I voluntarily do, I put my whole and soul into it…and I don’t do so for praise… I do it because I am almost compelled to… because it gives me internal satisfaction…. But I cannot deny that when such work is in a position to be evaluated, the evaluation means a terrible lot to me… it doesn’t mean that I work harder because I work as hard even if no one will evaluate it… but there is a different type of satisfaction that I look forward to in the end… one could call it praise, one could call it appreciation, one could call it a slap on the back, anything… but it makes a hell of a lot of difference to me… When I look back I think that I have not always been sensitive to how important praise or encouraging words are to people… and now when I was deprived of it… I felt only too keenly what it must feel like… to put yourself into something wholeheartedly believing you’re doing your best and to look forward to hear some good words… only to get none. Only criticism.
It is sad because I feel that when this happens not only do you stop looking forward to appreciation which means you lose a key source of motivation… but the opposite party loses even more… the opportunity to be a source of positive influence.

posted by Sylvia D'souza at 5:07 am 0 comments
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