by anagram » Thu Jan 28, 2016 1:53 am
semi-random mood anomalies aside, whether i'm affected or not by praise or criticism depends almost exclusively on context and on who is praising/criticising me. or, more specifically, it depends on whether the person's opinion matters to me (either by personal choice or due to the circumstances, like with a client). by default, a person's opinion doesn't matter to me until there's a reason for it to matter
in impersonal circumstances, it makes me worried and anxious about accountability. i'm not employed by anyone, but the work i do is usually for big companies. i have learned in practice that the #1 motivator for all work done in big companies and any other corporate-like environment is deflecting accountability as much possible. if you want to survive in that kind of ecosystem, it's what you have to do. it's what the whole work structure is based on. praise means i'm not being held accountable. criticism means i am. it's how it works
with the very few people whose opinion matters to me in a personal way, it's different. i can be affected very deeply. it affects my entire state of mind and the way i look at things. although the measure there for how much it affects me is not the degree of praise or criticism, but the fear of loss that may be associated (or relief, when i'm being praised). so i may be inflexible about whatever i'm being criticised on, even if i'm not defensive about it (and either way i almost certainly won't react much, at least in person), but i'll be distraught anyway, because of what the criticism may entail
tl;dr i'm affected by praise and criticism almost entirely based on how i read the motivations behind it and possible implications of it, not for the expression of opinion itself. praise and criticism are given for a multitude of reasons, and it's very rarely about expressing facts. i don't think i ever take it at face value, no matter who it's coming from