Insulted?!

Parenting 101- I don't know why we don't teach kids this, 'cause it's dead easy to do if we practice, but I made sure to put it in Draco's brain early:
It's weird to feel personally insulted by someone we don't personally know.

Even if they do know us, in order to feel insulted by somebody, we have to voluntarily give the person value first. We have to value who they are, and we have to value their words. This is just a simple statement of fact, I know, but it's strange that we don't seem to remember this. In fact, we often seem to immediately grant people power over us.

Like, our first reaction should be vetting the person. We can do it with a couple quick questions. 1) Do I respect and admire this person and their views? 2) Is this input useful to me? If the answer to either is no, then we just shitcan it.

If we don't do this by habit, it can sound robotic and hard; and it's true, if we don't regularly practice telling our emotions to chill out and see what the brain thinks, we'll probably react instead of think.

But it's really not that hard; at all, actually. After a little practice, the instant somebody begins firing data at us a little filter engages that qualifies the person and the data. And if it fails the test, the emotions never even engage. We can then choose from a multitude of options better for us.

Anyway, it's just been on my mind, and when I see people having to, like, shut down their Facebook pages and unfriend people and stuff, I'm like, "Why did you give them that much power over how you feel?"

Anyway, if you don't usually do this, I recommend you try it, because sitting at the computer banging out retorts while our hearts pound sounds really really bad for us. Totally optional, trust me.

 

To your face; behind your back - either way you have to give a shit to be angry, which is entirely optional. In fact, you have to deliberately give their opinion value in order for it to matter at all. This is the core of what I'm saying - switching from an "everybody gets in" model, to "only a few get in," right from the get-go. Takes a touch of practice; life-transformingly worth it.

 

The difference is one being a situation in which you intentionally expose yourself to criticism, i.e. posting music on a forum, vs. feeling like you have to address the random criticisms of strangers in virtually any context.

Truly, any good idea can be corrupted, and broad-brush minimizing all criticisms is one way to do it for sure. But someone else's doing that isn't our concern. We have our hands full remembering that we have complete control over who and what input we value, and further what we decide to do with it. As a foundational belief, it's a good one. And it frees up a lot of energy and patience with which to face legitimate criticisms patiently.