Get over Criticisms with these Tips

I get uneasy when someone picks up my work or reads my work and tells me he or she doesn’t like it.

It feels so discouraging, and I get worked up immediately.

As a writer, criticism is one of the things that can’t be avoided; how you can avoid it is when you don’t write anything at all.

You might not be a writer, you might be a teacher, a fashion designer, a musician, a photographer, etc; one way or another, people evaluate your works and may criticize them.

Criticisms, if allowed, can be a huge discourager.

Recently, I had a feeling someone passed a comment on my creative work, and it was one of those comments that didn’t quite hit the right notes. I felt immediately worked up and I started doubting myself.

“Can I actually do this thing?”

“Maybe I shouldn’t be doing this”

“Maybe this isn’t the right work for me”, these were some of the thoughts and questions that kept crossing my mind.

Soon after I got over that, I realized that we can’t really control what other people say, but we can control how we react to them, and our own efforts that will prevent them from saying such the next time.

And so, if your work is being criticized, here are some tips for you:

Be objective: look at the issue from a neutral point of view and try to determine the truth from falsehood. For instance, do you need to restart the work or you just need to adjust some things? Do you need to go back and read up on some things or do you need to expand those things a bit more? These are some of the questions you need to ask yourself.
Don’t take it personally: this may be difficult, but endeavour to avoid taking criticisms personally. It does no good, it only makes one angry and bitter.
Look at the intentions: is the person passing the comment from a sincere point of view or is the person passing the comments just to be mischievous?
Learn from it: one of the ways you can turn a criticism around is to learn from it. Critically examine the criticism, how can you learn from it? What can you do better next time? How can you develop yourself to avoid such criticisms next time?
Move on! don’t ever dwell in regret or bitterness. Once you’ve learnt from a criticism, move on!

How have you had to deal with criticisms? Would you like to share your experiences with us? Drop your thoughts in the comments section below.