Honesty with the Most Important Person

I was reminded this week about how important it is to be honest with the most important person in your life, that person is you. Nobody is perfect however, badly we may want to be.  The most important relationship you will ever has is the one that you have with yourself.  Being self aware isn't crucial to life however, I think it really is crucial to self development both professional and personal. I know that sometimes this is like fumbling around in the dark not really knowing what is wrong but knowing that something is really wrong.  Sometimes it's glaringly obvious to everyone else and yet you are unable to see it in yourself.  At other times you know that you are going in the wrong direction or are being less than honest with yourself yet you lack the emotional energy or will to do anything about it.  For other people self awareness is so far off their personal radar they have not one single clue and blame everyone else in their lives for the things that are going wrong.

How do we become self aware? How do we know we are not just beating ourselves up? How do we know that other people aren't just being mean when they make a criticism? Are our instincts good or are they so far off base that it's unbelievable? Do you catch your family and friends rolling their eyes in disbelief? There's really three parts to ourself image.  First of all there's the part that we project to others, this would include how we are at work or how we behave with strangers. Secondly, there's the person that we would like to be and that's our fantastical image that we present to ourselves an example of this might be thinking you are a wonderful human being but in fact are pretty cruel to the people around you or you think you are a faultless parent.There is no such thing as a faultless parent by the way just ask my kids. Thirdly, the person that you actually are, and this is the person that you really should get to know. It might not be a bad idea to really fall madly and deeply in love with that person.  That would be unconditional love. The love where you accept that you are perfectly imperfect and are still a lovable human.

Being open to criticism is hard, particularly hard for some of us.  Its an area you can work on.  I'm currently and in fact always working on this area.  This doesn't mean that you have to take onboard everything people say about you but, it's important to be a bit self reflective regarding criticisms. Every criticism you receive holds some value to you. If you are having difficulty accepting criticism this might stem from your childhood experience of criticism or you may have a fragile self esteem where criticism of any kind feels like a personal attack.  Its helpful to me to step back and ask myself is this criticism an accurate reflection of what I am projecting to this person? Is this assessment accurate in other ways? How could I improve how I express myself so I am projecting a more authentic version of myself?  Its really important that you fully believe the person who is criticizing you because their assessment holds an important key to your own self development and understanding of how others perceive you. It's equally important that your perception of yourself doesn't alter too much. There is a real danger of developing into a person who is suffering from the need to please disease. Your self esteem and self confidence can really suffer if you take criticism too seriously.

I'm always being criticised for being a smartass.  This assessment is an accurate assessment of me. I am a smartass, I don't perceive it as a negative thing, my sons pointed out the positive elements of smartass behave to me years ago.  Being a smartass and a woman can have negative connotations that I just don't want to bore you with today. As it turns out being a smartass is an attribute I have passed onto my children.  We are in fact a family of smartasses and our smartassery is the source of great humour and jocularity.  I would go so far as saying that our smartassness forms the backbone of our family culture.  If I tried to change this about myself I would be flirting with need to please disease and nobody should go there.  I do find arenas where my smartassness is fully appreciated for what it is  for example close friends and family members. I hold back on the smartassery where it's appropriate. At work I do a lot of thinking smartass things but not saying them out loud.  There are times that you have to ask yourself who has the problem here?  If it turns out that its the person giving the criticism that has the problem that's something for them to work on.  You can happily go on with your life and let that guy work on his own issues. If it's someone you love and you think they are ready to receive information about themselves then go ahead and gently mention something to them.

I recently read a criticism of one counsellor to another counsellor which went something like this "What are doing therapy for yourself on your clients are you?".  Something along those lines. This is not a very nice way to point out your reality to a person.  Another way to say this could have been "sounds like you've been really hurt before, are you completely over that?" or you could say "It's sometimes not helpful to clients when you self disclose about things like this." you could say "When I read that article I got the feeling that you had a lot of current pain going on that might harm your clients'.  No matter how you say things that are critical in nature you run the risk of the person becoming defensive and missing the important point.  One thing is certain when delivering criticism take the smartass button off because the other thing that is 100% guaranteed is that you are not perfect yourself.  If the person does become defensive which by the way is a normal response just apologize and give them some space to think about it. Don't get into a right fight nothing is achieved in those conversations not for you or for the other person. I find that accepting that I packaged the criticism ineffectively and dropping it like it's hot is the best approach for me. You might find a better way to handle defensiveness and if you have share it with me.