Would you mercilessly criticise a good friend who just made a huge blunder in order to help her get on track again? Of course not.
If you’re like most women, you’d be kind and supportive. You might be tough, but you’d be fair, letting your friend know that you were there for her. So why do we think that beating ourselves up helps us to be at our best?
It just so happens that the morning after writing my last blog post, I found this article on a UK news website that takes an incisive look at WHY we women are so hard on ourselves.
The quote I pulled above I think is the best reason I could think of to start a move toward personal positivity. If a friend came to you and started beating herself up verbally. She says she’s fat, ugly, dumb, her shoes are coordinated with her handbag, etc. what would you do? Would you sit there and agree with her and add to the list things she should change? Or would you stick up for her and tell her all the things she does RIGHT? If your answer is the former, well, to be blunt, I’m glad I don’t know you.
Not only does the media tell us, as women, that we need to aspire to an impossible level of physical perfection, but make us feel like it is our natural duty to nurture everyone else in the process. How exhausting.
My favorite part of the article, however, has to be when the author talks about the ultimate backhanded compliment she’s ever received: “You are very beautiful. Don’t ever shave your mustache.” A) How hilarious. B) What do you think she was more apt to remember later that night - the beautiful or the mustache?
Why is it that if we were handed five compliments and one insult right in a row, we would be more apt to remember the insult than anything else? What if we started listening more to the positive things the good people say and letting the negative things the douches say?
Tomorrow’s new assignment: really listening next time someone gives you a compliment. Not trying to downgrade what the person said with a sarcastic comment or an “oh stop.” Smiling, saying thank you, and really taking what they said to heart.
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