Why Do People Criticize? (Part Two)

So you see, in one situation we've got a kid who's natural gift or strength in personality happens to be that of "being responsible". Only the mother in this case is feeling guilt and shame for not having been responsible herself having not paid the light bill on time. The mom experiencing nervousness now that they might have their family's lights turned off, suddenly walks past her daughter's bedroom and notices that the daughter, Sarah, had not tucked her blanket under her pillow the precise way she as the mother thought at the time was highly necessary! Mom becomes very angry and accuses her daughter of not being responsible, and always needing her to stand over her to get anything done! Here we have one person who was wrong, becoming angry to another in the precise area within which she was wrong. Yet, while doing so, this daughter particularly "enjoyed" making up her bed promptly each morning, and was considerably responsible in the manner in which she did it! Yet, there was a need in the one who was wrong, to unconsciously criticize another who's very strength is in the area of her wrong! Again let me say, this "always" happens! Only when we are angry in our criticism, we do not see it. At the time of our intensity of harsh judgment, we are "convinced" we are right! Now, to take our analogy a bit further, in this story the mom's daughter becomes angry at her mother then "looks" irresponsible when she runs out the door screaming in anger, "Don't tell me what to do!" ... "I will run my life the way I good and well choose!!!"

This takes us to our next principle in criticism: Because a person's strength or gift will naturally attract criticism or even abuse at that very strength, it is sadly natural as well to react in anger, and thus use that very strength in it's opposite to hurt the one accusing falsely. In that way the incorrect accuser appears right and the deception continues and increases in dysfunctionality. In this case, the one angrily accused being actually responsible in behavior , then using that strength in anger to appear the opposite!

I put it this way, "Who is the person in all the world who is best at baking a 'terrible' cake?" Why, a "chef" of course! A "chef" who's job it is to bake wonderful cakes! Because he who knows all there is about how to bake "wonderful" cakes, knows better than anyone how to bake "terrible", I mean the most "awful" cakes in the whole world! (While it still looks quite good actually)!!!

The same is true of this daughter who makes up her bed each morning without being asked. "Being responsible" for her comes easy. "Being responsible" is a God given core in her personality that all other aspects of her human condition revolves around.

Now notice something. Being "responsible" is just "the other-side-of-the-coin" of being "irresponsible"! Like the chef. When asked (and if he's paid enough money) the chef will bake the worst cake on earth!!! (Someone who knows little about baking cakes will only make a "mediocre" bad cake!!!)

I've seen many, many "responsible" people, when provoked to anger, demonstrate levels of "irresponsibility" the rest of us had never "dreamed" of!!! ... Notice what I mean ...

(1) IRRESPONSIBILITY (The Message: "You are not responsible! "You are lazy!" "I have to do everything for you!!!) The Result: A person who is originally the irresponsible one, in angry criticism will provoke a responsible person to angrily use the strength of responsibility to be irresponsible in levels irresponsible person never knew!!!

(2) NOT GOOD ENOUGH (The Message: "You are stupid!" "You will never amount to anything!" "Nothing you say or do has any good or purpose!) The Result: A person who has done things to not feel worthy will in anger criticize the very person who's specific strength is that of having talent and natural potential. The person then with the talent, with the intelligence, will use that talent and intelligence creatively to frustrate the first person to levels un heard of by appearing untalented, stupid and unworthy!!!

(3) REFUSE TO LISTEN ( The Message: "You never listen to me!" "I could talk until I'm blue in the faces, and for you it would just go through one ear and out the other!") Picture someone standing over another person screaming, "You never listen to me!!!" While this person is screaming, which of the two is not listening??!!! Of course, it is the one who is "screaming"! With all the noise and hurtful words being made, that original person is the one wrong, and is absolutely not listening! ... Yet, the person being harshly accused of "not listening" has the "gift" of listening. And since he or she has the "gift" of listening, he or she also has with that gift, the ability to determine "what is worth listening to!" ... Now if that is done with anger or resentment to, as we have said, "get even", the strength of listening will be used to "not listen", and thus aggravate the screamer of the false accusation!

(4) SELFISH (The Message: "You care only about yourself!" "You are selfish and never think of others!") The one who is screaming the accusation of "not caring" is the person who is selfish, while the one who is being criticized in anger has a special "gift" of caring, and for this reason is being criticized! (Remember the "beam of wood" in the ship.) The fact that the caring person was present to hear the accusation, is an interesting sign that he cares. Finally, however, the caring person can lose patience, then "get even" in hatefulness that brings shock to everyone who witnesses it!

Some of the most naturally caring people can become "hateful" when pushed. I've seen healthy responsibleness "aggravated" out of people. And when you think about it, how many people have you known who grew up being told they would be nothing. Yet, later in life they became "leaders in their fields", and that, with amazing ingenuity!!!

Catholic psychology includes the concept that we humans possess in our selves a thing called sin. This sin, this brokenness, this propensity to do wrong, ... This spiritually rooted hatred we consciously and unconsciously project on others, sometimes includes hiding a wrong in ourselves by attacking what is right in others.

In other words, ... "Because it is consistent that a person who is wrong in a matter hides that wrong by accusing a person who is right and gifted in the precise area where the first person is wrong, it is also consistent that the person who is right and angrily criticized, will be tempted to react to that incorrect accusation or criticism with anger. Then if the person who is right reacts in anger to defend what is true about him or her, the person who was originally wrong looks right, because the person who was originally right looks wrong by defending angrily that which was originally right, which is, ... 'that he or she was originally falsely accused!'"

You see, when someone criticizes or falsely accuses, that person is wrong in that criticizing.