What is self-criticism, objective and subjective criticism in psychology. Excessive self-criticism - what it is, how to get rid of it. Self-criticism: good or bad

Meaning of the word

Self-criticism is a person’s reflective attitude towards himself. You could even say that this is the ability to independently look for errors in your actions and thoughts, understand them and try to correct them. If a person can boast of such an ability, then this indicates his absolute mental health. But if self-criticism turns into an obsession, then it can be considered a deviation.

Self-criticism, self-deprecation, or other variations of a destructive nature that cause feelings of guilt and shame are not synonymous with self-criticism. It is rather an objective point of view of oneself, where both positive and negative aspects of character are assessed.

How to Question Negative Thoughts

How to change the perception of negative thoughts, learn to question them and look for alternative ways of thinking to increase self-esteem? The technique of forming alternative views on various situations will help you with this (Table 2).

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Table 2. Combating excessive self-criticism

How much time can be spent looking for alternative approaches? You are not used to questioning your thoughts and looking for alternatives to your behavior: you simply do not have such a skill. Take your time: train as much as you like, develop the skills you have acquired. Remember - you learn from mistakes. The habit of self-criticism does not go away instantly. Your job is to exercise brain muscles that you haven't used before.

How to force yourself to change your train of thought when something is wrong with you. If what is happening is overwhelming you, it is difficult to gather strength and begin to analyze your thoughts. In this case, it would be best to write down your thoughts and feelings, describe the source of your bad mood, and return to looking for alternatives later when you come to your senses.

There is also no need to search for the right or appropriate answer. The answer will be “correct” if its presence in the memo gives you something - it should be meaningful, positive and promising for further constructive intervention. You need to look for the option that suits you best.

Basis

Self-criticism is a kind of outside view. Her judgments are based on a person's inner beliefs, principles and goals. And if a person correlates himself with his preferences, then this will be called self-criticism. But if a person begins to evaluate himself from the point of view of someone else’s value system, then this indicates an inadequate approach. Also inadequate can be called a complete lack of self-criticism (although this may be caused by a low level of intellectual development). If a person is overly self-critical, then he suffers from low self-esteem.

Self-criticism is a samurai sword, where all sides are sharp. It is impossible to unambiguously determine whether it is classified as a negative manifestation or whether one needs to work on its development.

Personal demon

Man is his own worst enemy. Sometimes it seems that it brings him unspeakable pleasure to spend a huge amount of time on his own criticism. Self-criticism is, of course, good, but at the same time it is the most common way to harm yourself.

Each of us has such a demon, which we are used to calling the inner voice, the unfriendly “I”, the inner critic, etc. This voice often sounds in the head and consists of thoughts full of criticism. And we tend to take all these negative thoughts at face value. To understand whether you are susceptible to the influence of your inner demon, consider doing something new and unusual. The demon will immediately come out, begin to point out weak points and repeat that there is nothing good in this idea, and, to put it mildly, your strength is not enough to implement it. These and similar words come from inner monsters of self-criticism all the time:

• You can not do it.
• They'll laugh at you.
• Who are you?
• Have you already forgotten the last time you sat in a puddle?!
• This is silly.
• To do this, you need to have what you don’t have, etc.

They are the ones who prevent you from living a full life, slowly and confidently achieving your cherished goals. Ultimately, being carried away by excessive self-criticism, a person will receive only one message: I am not good enough. But this will be more than enough for your whole life to go downhill.

Summary

1. Self-criticism is an ingrained habit. It does not always reflect your real state.
2. Self-criticism does much more harm than good. It depresses and saddens you.
3. It is within your power to learn to get rid of excessive self-criticism. Treat it as a feature of your thinking, and not a reflection of your personality.
4. Negative thoughts can be questioned. You can learn to notice these thoughts and their impact on your emotional and physical state or behavior. You can find a more balanced and gentle response to certain situations.
5. You can and should experiment with your perception of yourself: positive, less harsh; as if you are addressing not yourself, but another person.

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Example from life

Some people feel their own imperfections more than others. Usually no one talks about this, and even to himself is unable to admit his own inadequacy, but actions speak for themselves.

Here's a small example. One young and promising boss, let's call him Ricky, hired coaches to help him become a first-class leader. In total, he had about 50 people under his command and, despite the euphoria of his new appointment, he was shocked by the scale of responsibility. Subsequently, it turned out that Ricky has no problems with time management, he does not suffer from stress, but is simply convinced that he is not good enough. Regardless of what happens, Ricky is constantly dissatisfied with the current circumstances and his own behavior. He can't even name a few things that he is really good at, but if you touch on the topic of difficulties and problems, then Ricky is unstoppable. He is ready to talk for hours that he achieved success only because he constantly worked on his bad sides.

Good or bad?

Based on this, we can ask the question: is self-criticism good or bad? In Ricky's case, we can say that he was just lucky. Of course, self-improvement and working on yourself is a good idea. But you can’t do this with a feeling of your own imperfection. Otherwise, the more a person achieves, the more he will feel dissatisfaction.

Ricky, an example of self-criticism, after working with a coach was able to achieve outstanding success in his professional activities. But he succeeded not because he constantly found flaws in himself and tried to improve them, but because he began to pay attention to his strengths. Yes, yes, he had them, however, like every person. It is impossible to find anyone in the world who does not have some remarkable abilities.

How to properly criticize yourself?

08/19/2020 Zoryan Freidovich Psychology How clearly people understand their mistakes is evident from the fact that, when talking about their behavior, they always know how to present it in a noble light.

Francois La Rochefoucauld

Self-criticism is a person’s ability to objectively perceive himself, his words and actions, to see and correct his own mistakes. The presence of self-criticism is a sign of a mentally mature person prone to introspection and self-development.

Some people, not experienced in the intricacies of psychology, identify self-criticism with self-criticism, sad soul-searching and similar negative habits that generate feelings of guilt and hopelessness. Self-criticism is something completely different, namely constant self-accusation, caustic, painful epithets addressed to oneself, underestimation of one’s worth without any attempts to correct the situation.

On the contrary, self-criticism is the ability to evaluate yourself as honestly as possible and equally note your shortcomings and strengths. This always has the goal of correcting and improving oneself.

The basis of self-criticism is a person’s system of internal beliefs, determined by his values, principles and a certain “code of honor”, ​​formed on the basis of observing other people, identifying himself with book and film characters, and imitating his parents.

Evolutionarily, self-criticism performs the following tasks:

• indicates the direction of self-improvement;
• gives an objective view of oneself;
• teaches you to recognize your negative qualities and shortcomings;
• the ability to learn from mistakes;
• motivation to achieve new goals;
• strengthening courage and self-confidence;
• cutting off some negative qualities (arrogance, the illusion “I’m always right”, intolerance to other people’s successes, envy, etc.);
• willingness to correct mistakes.

Incorrectly performed self-criticism leads to such phenomena as:

• self-humiliation and self-flagellation;
• decreased self-esteem and personality destruction;
• depression and unstable mental state;
• lack of self-confidence and strength;
• apathy and inaction;
• inability to make decisions;
• isolation and indifference;
• lack of faith in the forces of life and in oneself;
• inability to see one's strengths;
• excessive demands on oneself;
• guilt and susceptibility to manipulation.

How to criticize yourself correctly?

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In order not to lose justice to yourself, it is best to have a scale formed from your values ​​and beliefs. You also need to have a healthy lifestyle. A reasonable and objectively self-critical person knows what is important to him and can determine which qualities need to be developed and which become an obstacle to achieving the goal. After all, this is what helps to find the right direction for self-development. In this case, self-criticism will become a good support and serve as an incentive to improve yourself and achieve success.

So:

1. Be honest with yourself.

Sometimes life forces us to lie (for example, when answering questions about yourself from envious, unfriendly people, you should not open your soul and speak as you really are). On the contrary, self-criticism as a dialogue with oneself is primarily honesty and frankness. There is no point in hiding something from yourself or making excuses. Our soul is the best confessor, the most patient and responsive listener.

2. Don't start to despise yourself.

No mistakes, setbacks or failures are worth making you stop respecting yourself. Read the memoirs of repressed scientists, doctors, and priests. No matter what imaginary crimes the Stalinist pack attributed to them, they retained self-respect and self-esteem. If you really acted poorly (whether due to floating self-esteem, or out of fear), then you need to correct the mistake and continue to work on yourself, without feeling useless or worthless. Mistakes are a part of life for each of us, but they are not a reason to feel contempt for yourself.

3. Curb your pride.

Pride is a caricature of pride, its excess. This feeling can deceive us, convincing us that we are always right, and prevent us from looking critically at our lives and individual actions. The pacification of pride will allow us to stand on the same level as other people and begin to show more respect and interest in them and become richer in soul and more interesting.

4. Don’t develop an “always guilty” complex.

It is necessary to understand and correct your guilt - this is a manifestation of conscience. However, if guilt hangs around your neck for many years, this leads to self-criticism, depression, and a feeling of being unhappy and useless to anyone. Atonement for guilt is a necessary measure of cleansing oneself and the space around.

5. Build wisdom.

When you began to develop self-criticism, your attitude towards yourself, the world, and people began to change. Collect grains of new experience, write down your personal conclusions, form the foundations of wisdom.

6. Listen to smart, friendly people.

It is not always possible for a person to be able to independently see what he is wrong or mistaken about. But those nearby can clearly see it. Many honest people with selfless love for humanity wish you well and themselves want you to become better.

7. Criticize yourself out loud in private.

This is a very useful and effective technique. By speaking out loud your mistake and ways to correct it, you hear yourself as if from the outside, and at the right moment you can correct some conclusions, conclusions, and quickly correct the current situation.

Always remember that the purpose of self-criticism is to teach yourself to reflect and be honest with yourself in order to reach a new level, becoming able to overcome your weaknesses and delusions. Self-criticism serves as a basic objective self-assessment and is extremely necessary for any person.

Source: shkolazhizni.ru

psychology, introspection, self-criticism, self-esteem, self-development

Fear of Inadequacy

In general, every person should be able to critically evaluate their own actions and thoughts, accurately identify their weaknesses and know how to correct them. But at the same time, he should not neglect his strengths. Some people can draw, some can sing, and some are programming geniuses.

It’s just that people tend to expect approval from their environment. It is precisely because of the expectation of this approval that we try to squeeze ourselves into a framework that we have never met and will never meet.

Correct self-criticism

To understand how well we rate ourselves, we need to do the following. Take a piece of paper and at the very top write: “I should.” And then list down everything that you think needs to be done. For example, “I should communicate more,” “I should sleep less,” etc. Then you need to re-read these points and select the most basic ones. Most often, these are the first five positions to which a person pays the most attention. These points need to be reconsidered again, whether they are important, whether they really allow a person to remain himself. If not, then maybe they appeared due to the obsessive influence of public opinion?!

About self-criticism

As Einstein said: “You cannot judge a fish by its ability to climb trees. Otherwise, she will live her whole life considering herself a fool.” This also applies to a person’s self-criticism. In our society, it is customary to look up to the best, and, unfortunately, no one thinks that these “best” were initially endowed with a completely different set of qualities.

Yes, a person can cultivate anything in himself, but will he be happy if he leaves aside what he really has talent for?

And finally, a few quotes about self-criticism. With their help you can look at the other side of this process:

Self-criticism is hidden praise; people criticize themselves in order to show an open-minded attitude.

We criticize ourselves in order to be praised.

In self-criticism there is no need to stoop to rudeness.

It’s good to take a rational approach to assessing your own actions, identifying your strengths and weaknesses. But if your inner demons begin to say: “You are worthless!”, then you need to make every effort to bring them under control.

Objective and subjective criticism

Objective criticism is an assessment of facts. Subjective criticism is an attitude based on the feelings and emotions of the individual.

In a broad sense, an objective assessment can be thought of as an understanding of a specific character trait, and a subjective assessment can be thought of as an overall assessment of a person based on just one trait. What this means: I am forgetful, but this does not make me an incompetent employee or a bad friend, I can write down important details. Or: I have a short temper, but I know how to maintain self-control, which makes me a good person.

Objective criticism usually provides accurate data and contains almost no evaluation. Subjective criticism is more often of an evaluative nature, “good or bad.” For example, a person considers himself pitiful, worthless. But if he looks solely at the facts, he will see that he has made good progress in his career, motivates his friends, and is generally much happier than others. Where did the attitude of worthlessness originally come from? This is a belief that was once someone's subjective criticism.

Parental demands, inadequate reproach, punishment, humiliation, insults, and lack of praise give rise to an attitude of worthlessness and act as a prerequisite for excessive self-criticism. In adult life, such people do not give themselves the right to make mistakes. And our goal is to learn to turn any subjective (personal) opinion into an adequate objective assessment (criticism).