Responding to Negative Comments

If you write blogs, article content on your website, post videos or share information on social media you are open to negative comments each time you post something.

Scrolling through comments can feel like a “dodgem cars” ride. Mainly smooth with occasional bumps but you manage to keep balanced. And then you get completely thrown off balance.

Reading positive comments feels good. It confirms you’re on the right track. Some negative comments can be annoying but you skim over them easily. But then you come across negative comments that really throw you off balance. Piss you off.

Your instinctive response may be to retaliate to set things straight. To justify yourself and your point of view. To prove them wrong. You may resort to name calling, swearing and a “tit for tat” behaviour.

You may decide to block them from commenting in the future and check the “no comments allowed” box on all your posts.

Or, you may stop posting all together.

You may feel anxious, angry, judged, embarrassed and just plain hurt. Whatever is triggered within can have an impact on all areas of your life. Your peace is disturbed. Can’t sleep thinking about it. Tell your friends about the injustice. Try to warn others. Retreat or write a post about it.

You may turn the situation into an internal war. Engage your control freak mode and tell the person to be more considerate. To think before they comment. To choose their words wisely because it’s not nice to hurt other people’s feelings etc. etc.

But how is the person making the comment supposed to know what you’re sensitive about? Your insecurities. Your triggers. And the emotional baggage you carry within.

Where does our emotional baggage come from in the first place?

Most of our beliefs are created during the growing years. Children are like sponges, soaking up everything they see and hear in their environment. The good, the bad and the ugly either from their parents, siblings, teachers or friends.

As children we often take our parent’s fear as our own and create feelings of inadequacy, not being good enough or not being worthy of love. Then we collect some more fear based beliefs from other family members, teachers or friends or anyone in our environment.

For example, if your school teacher told you that you will never amount to anything you may have created a belief that you will never succeed in life. Maybe your parents compared you to the clever children in your class making you feel stupid.

This is how we create beliefs that are not true to self. We take on other people’s fear as our own and create insecurities according to their comments.

Eventually children grow up into adults with built-in insecurities. Becoming people pleasers to feel loved. Creating dependencies, attachments to people, substances or money to feel a sense of worthiness. Rely on external gratifications about their looks, material possessions and other ego pampering behaviour to feel safe.

We look for love on the outside and lose ourselves in this pursuit of love, a sense of belonging and safety.

We carry our insecurities throughout life and bring them into relationships, work or social situations. And sooner or later we get triggered or we trigger others.

So, the next time your emotions get triggered make a conscious decision to respond in a way that benefits everyone. Instead of blaming the person, look within and ask yourself what this may be about. What you may be learning about yourself from their comment.

Start the process of releasing those beliefs that make you feel inadequate, incompetent, ugly, undesirable, unworthy, unloved, rejected, abandoned or any other beliefs that create limited thoughts and actions.

Releasing emotional baggage is much easier than carrying it around. The heaviness and the density eventually affects our health. The body starts buckling under pressure resulting in chronic back pain, shoulder pain, weakness in the knees and ankles. It becomes tired of carrying the load and tries to get our attention.

Exploring our belief system may feel scary and foreign at first because we grow up believing that everything in our reality comes from the outside of us. And we tend to attempt to fix the outside. We blame others and want them to change their behaviour. And looking within to explore our emotions feels like diving deep into the abyss of unpleasant memories waiting to devour our entire being.

But actually, it’s quite the opposite.

Everything we experience is created from within.

From our beliefs. What we believe, we become!

And what lurks within is the stuff that doesn’t belong to us. Someone else’s fear and beliefs that we mistakenly took as our own and now that shit needs to go.

For example, if you get angry when someone criticises your work this is a sign to take action. To go within and assess your beliefs. Maybe you believe that you are not good enough and have been fooling yourself and others all this time. Maybe you lack confidence and compare with others in your field. Maybe you’re lazy, cut corners and afraid of being found out. These are all fear based beliefs and need to go. You need to find out if these beliefs are true.

Denying our emotional pain and trying to stuff it down or sweep it under the carpet only prolongs the suffering and prevents our growth. Ignored and suppressed emotions can’t transform. They have to be acknowledged first. Once transformed the fear disappears and we won’t have to deal with that issue ever again.

This is growth. This is freedom.

Each time we release beliefs that weigh us down we feel lighter and more liberated. Free to be authentic. True to self. And free from desiring external validation.

Let’s have a look at some examples:

Scenario 1

Jane is an astrologer who writes weekly posts on social media. She has her own perspective about the planetary movements and their effects. Different to most astrologers. She uses her intuition and has a different perspective on the meaning of some placements of the planets and the houses they fall into. She is usually accurate but her perspective and the way she goes about determining the outcomes is confusing for some people.

Jane often receives abusive comments from readers accusing her of talking rubbish and that she should learn from “real” astrologers.

Every time Jane reads one of these comments it feels like a blow to her gut. She gets angry and tells them to get lost and stop reading her posts if they don’t like her perspective on astrology. Then she loses interest in posting and retreats for a while.

Eventually Jane got sick of this repetitive anger/retreat cycle and decided to get some help. During a therapy session, she went back to a childhood memory of her mum telling her to fit in and behave like other normal children. Her mum’s comment made her believe that being different was wrong. Unacceptable by the society. And now in adulthood, she is criticised again for her individuality. For being different.

As Jane brought awareness to the pain she was carrying all her life she realised that there is nothing wrong with being different. That was her mum’s fear not hers. As a small child she took on her mum’s fear of standing out from the crowd as her own fear.

Maybe her Mum was trying to protect her from the harsh world and thought that blending and fitting in would be safer. But that wasn’t Jane’s true personality. She couldn’t blend in and be invisible. She had to shine in her own right. She had too much to offer the world with her unique perspective on astrology.

Scenario 2

Mary loves dining out and writing reviews about restaurants in her local area. She visits the restaurants, wines and dines, interviews the chefs then writes about her experience.

One of the restaurant owners wasn’t happy with her review and commented back that she shouldn’t be writing restaurant reviews because she had no experience or knowledge about the hospitality industry.

Mary was very upset. She didn’t think that her review was damaging to his business in any way and couldn’t understand why he took an offense. She tried to contact him but he refused to talk to her. Mary felt hurt and rejected. Couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t talk to her.

She never found out why the restaurant owner was upset with her but in the end it didn’t matter. She couldn’t change him or his opinion. And she didn’t have to. It was her pain and her responsibility to make a change.

After some self-reflection Mary realised that she never got over the breakup with ex-partner Pete. She remembered Pete telling her that he didn’t love her anymore, packed his things and left. Mary tried contacting him on several occasions but he never responded. She felt rejected. Suddenly this realisation flashed through Mary’s mind and she had an “aha” moment. When the restaurant owner refused to talk to her it reminded her of Pete and how he refused to talk to her.

This awareness transformed everything. Mary finally released her pent up emotions and let Pete go. And it didn’t matter that the restaurant owner didn’t want to speak to her. He just triggered her emotions that needed to go and now Mary was grateful that he did. She is finally free from her past.

Scenario 3

David is a model husband. His wife Jenny and her friends often comment how she found herself a gem. He’s easy going. Popular and friendly. Works hard and brings home a good pay to support his family. On the outside everything looks great. Perfect family. Jenny looks after everything. She doesn’t have any other interests apart from looking after their home and family. She organises all their functions and David just comes along. All his needs are taken care of. Even his brother in law is like a brother to him.

Everything seems happy at home but David often gets angry at the guys at work for teasing him that he needs his wife’s permission before going out for drinks after work. David always feels uneasy and belittled with their teasing. Doesn’t argue with them just retreats into his shell.

One day the teasing went too far and David got really angry and started shouting. This was so unlike him. His behaviour surprised everyone. David couldn’t take it anymore and couldn’t work out why he gets so angry when the guys question his masculinity.

After some soul searching he remembered his father always telling him to man up. To speak up and behave like a man. But David was a gentle sensitive soul and didn’t see any need for the macho behaviour. Even his first girlfriend kept pushing him to be more masculine. But he couldn’t, so she left him. He was heartbroken.

When David met Jenny he fell in love with her caring nature. And she never pushed him. She accepted him and his sensitivity. David settled into married life and let his wife make all decisions. He became a people pleaser. He allowed his gentle sensitive nature become a deficit. Instead of speaking up and being Jenny’s equal he chose to play an inferior role.

David finally realised that he abandoned himself and tried to fill his need for love through pleasing others. As he acknowledged his feelings it felt like a huge weight was lifted off his shoulders. He felt empowered and everything changed.

David and Jenny went separate ways and two years later he met his perfect match. Ana was a few years older but they bonded instantly, accepting each other without conditions or a need to downplay their needs and heart’s desires. As David learned to love and accept himself he attracted a woman who also loved and accepted him.

Processing emotions in not as difficult as carrying them around. If we’re not careful, our emotional baggage can develop a personality and become our spokesperson. It tells our work colleagues to be careful what they say as we have sensitive feelings. The baggage carrying jealousy and fear of rejection gets dumped onto our love partner. The social outcast baggage gossips and gets surprised when it’s gossiped about. Our emotional baggage can make a meal out of our daily activities. It sticks together and creates separations until we proclaim: “No more fear, no more BS behaviour! All emotional baggage has reached its use by date and has to go!”

Those who process their emotions easily have a high level of emotional intelligence. They don’t get triggered by negative comments. They don’t take things personally. Don’t react defensively. Don’t create a scene. They deal with issues with calmness and maturity accepting all kinds of feedback, even the feedback with negative connotations, because they are able to discern between valuable and useless information.

Those with difficulty processing their emotions have a low level of emotional intelligence. They tend to behave in defensive immature ways. Fear for their safety, blame and restrict others and don’t take responsibility for their own growth.

For example, a team leader who lacks leadership skills disempowers her team to feel a sense of security. She may believe that limiting the team will eliminate any threats to her leadership position.

Even if you have a low level of emotional intelligence it’s not the end of the world. It can be improved but you have to be willing to do the work. The more emotional baggage you release the easier it becomes to process emotions and act in mature ways.

As mentioned earlier, criticism is not always about you and your baggage. Sometimes it’s projected by others. Their emotional pain, their fear, their baggage.

People make negative comments for various reasons. Their intention may be constructive or destructive.

For example:

• Projection – when the person airs their own dirty laundry, projects their misery onto others

• Suggestion for improvement – reader offering another option to add depth to the post, perceived as a negative comment only if the writer’s negative ego takes the front stage

• Unrealistic expectations – reader showing their disappointment publicly, maybe didn’t get the answer they wanted

• Personal attack - to discredit the writer, either by someone already known to them or a competitor writer or blogger

How can we tell if the comment is our emotional baggage or theirs?

The answer lies in our response. If our emotions don’t get triggered by their comment then it’s their baggage. But if our emotions get triggered then it’s ours. Our responsibility to take action. It may not feel like it at the time because our emotions are stirred, but this is a great opportunity for growth. It’s a perfect time to look within, assess our belief system, bring awareness to what doesn’t align with the true self and then let it go, release limitations and make space for more self-love.

Bringing our awareness to emotional issues sets us free.

Our emotions are energy and all energy wants to be acknowledged. As we bring our awareness to the way we feel, the energy transforms.

Our beliefs transform.

Our behaviour changes.

We stop the people pleasing behaviour.

We stop seeking external validation.

We stop pretending.

We stop blaming.

We stop asking others.

We start trusting our intuition.

We allow more space for self-love.

We follow the beat of our own drum.

We set healthy boundaries.

Releasing is an ongoing process. We unload our emotional baggage one by one each time we get triggered. It gets easier as we go along especially when we know how the process works.

Let’s take a look at the releasing process.

When triggered by a comment:

• Stop and take a few deep slow breaths

• Ask yourself why the comment upset you

• Think about how it makes you feel

• What emotions are stirred

• What is your belief around the way you feel?

• Does it remind you of anything?

• Have you heard it before?

• Recognise where it came from

• Breathe out and let it go

• Give yourself a pat on the back for a job well done

Now that you know how to release you can also think about how the positive comments can affect you. Reading something nice about our posts feels good. But did the positive feedback pamper you ego making you feel powerful or did it go deeper?

Did it resonate through your entire body letting you know that your service is on target, helping people?

As you can see the negative and positive comments can help us grow to serve humanity and not just to boost our self-serving behaviour. Comments from other people help us grow. Let’s stay on target and make all our intentions for the betterment of humanity.

Hope you enjoyed my information and I hope it helps you free yourself from limitations!

Let me know, all feedback is welcome. I know how to discern and either way it will help me grow.

You can contact me via the feedback form on my website: www.snscourses.com or email me: [email protected]

In gratitude,

Nancy Stjepanovic, Dip Prof Couns