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Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#411
I actually make my objectivity a point of pride.

Yes, there is a bit of a sting when you put up a PR or a design doc and your teammates basically roast it, but then there is a prideful "oh yeah, I'm someone who doesn't take any of this personally."

It's part of being an engineer, working in engineering culture. It's not personal, and it makes the codebase better. It helps to remember that your goal is the long-term health of the platform, not a little bit of your PR that you thought was clever.

It also helps to avoid toxic teams. In a good team, feedback is offered objectively, without judgement or attack.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#412
Some body stopped you from shipping a mistake. Just like when someone stops you to tell you your fly is down or a shoe is untied, feel a little embarrassed, and a little grateful that they didn't let you walk around like that all day.

> feeling bad for honest mistakes.

Use it as an impetus to get better. If you make the same kind of mistake repeatedly how can you modify the way you write code to not do that anymore. There is a popular saying "the worst code I know of is code I wrote six months ago", but if you aren't analyzing and improving (not just changing), then it will be just as true six months from now. Code from the previous month should be better than the code from two months ago and so on, otherwise you are chasing fashion and quality is stagnating.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#413

What you have encountered is actually one of the necessary steps to really become "a senior developer". And congratulations, you have already passed the biggest part of that hurdle: becoming aware of the issue. There are things that are fragile, things that break when they encounter a shock. Such as porcelain, when transported. There are things that are non-fragile, things that do not break when they encounter a simi…

The immune system metaphor is complicated because, while it is true that you build resistance, it's often not without some permanent damage, even if mild and neglectable. There may be an analogy for vaccines and constructive criticism somewhere. Even muscle strengthening seems to require minor injuries to the tissue. Tougher but demaged.

> Tougher but damaged.

You're thinking scar tissue, which analogously would be a maladaptive response to criticism (inflating ego, projecting fault).

Muscle strengthening doesn't cause permanent damage unless you overdo it.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#414
You know, you could consider getting therapy. Being sensitive to criticisms often results from something deeper, such as insecurity or some kind of vulnerability. There are lots of different therapeutic modalities, but CBT may work well, since you can look into the roots of this mindfully, and develop meaningful changes. The outcomes can be more than better coping or masking.

I’m going to go out on a limb for the next two suggestions, particularly the second one.

Psychedelics with a strong therapeutic intent, can not only help loosen the psychological armoring we create to shield us from vulnerability, but also help make changes when belief structures can be cleaned up and changes. You would want to work with people who do this way (instead of partying with it), or with therapists that administers this with a clinical protocol. These should include integration sessions to help bring the insights and changes to your daily life.

There is also the option of working with acupressure or acupuncture, with the caveat that most licensed acupuncturists do not know how to work with this. They usually take a holistic approach and stick to what are called the twelve ordinary meridians. If the roots of sensitivity to criticisms is in your physical health, this may catch it. Holistic treatment though, means the provider won’t specifically target what you came in asking help for.

If you are lucky and find a provider that works with the eight extraordinary meridians, there are two specifically related to sensitivity to criticisms. These are the yin and yang qiao mai, with the yin qiao mai directly expressing your consciousness’s ability to receive criticism, as well as insecurity, vulnerability, etc. Yang qiao mai expresses your ability to give others criticism without being a jerk.

It’s not as if using these methods are like using a magic pill. However, they can greatly accelerate whatever therapy you are working with.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#415
I design products, sometimes for others and sometimes for myself. A lot of that process is visual design. Everyone has an opinion when it comes to visual design. I stopped letting criticisms bother me because they had one of a few outcomes. 1 - it created an improvement of the product. Great! and I got to learn something 2 - someone had an opinion. None of these things warrant having your feelings hurt.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uhm...I have to chime in here. "Anti-fragile attitude" when it comes to criticism is not built by tolerance. Quite the opposite actually. It is a common misconception. While making yourself numb against criticism IS a solution but not by far the best one. A high criticism tolerance is learned by understanding that ones self worth is not attached to output or delivery. (This is hard in our industry) It comes from self…

A low self esteem from constant insults (aka non-constructive or overly harshly presented critique) or lack of encouragement will kill anybody's ability to accept useful feedback, and people can certainly become numb to that. However, that numbness is different than being unaccustomed to taking useful critique without getting defensive. Which is absolutely a learned skill– one of the most important you learn early in…

> low self esteem from ... non-constructive or overly harshly presented critique

ok firstly Comments about the individual in a CR is way out of line.

There is a massive difference between "This code will fail in " and "You failed " ... The latter is out of line and should be addressed head on with a manager present or a person who will enforce it's toxicity.

Now that said, criticism of code should always been allowed. It either has certain properties or it does not. A discussion of economics (scope/timelines/applicability) are a middle ground. But either the code has a race condition or it doesnt. It's easily read (which is best judged by the reader, not the writer)... It's missing some property that is desirable.

If one takes a criticism of code as a criticism of self, that is ego crossing over to where it doesn't belong. I like to remember The bridge will either hold the load or not regardless of how one feels about it. "This wont hold 1 ton" is better information than "Have you considered what happens if you put 1 ton on this?" .. The former informs you of something that must change, the latter leaves uncertainty and obscurity where infact the answer is already known.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#417
Your perspective should be that you are on the same team trying to achieve a common goal.

Do you get upset when you’re playing soccer and a teammate calls out for a pass? Or when you’re playing a video game and a teammate calls out an enemy approaching you from your blind spot?

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#418
post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You are not your lines of code. I think you actually are, in a very real sense. Someone else would have written different lines of codes. The lines of code are a function of yourself, an inherent part of you. Criticizing the lines of code criticizes that part of you. You can’t criticize a novel without implicitly criticizing its author. When we criticize an LLM’s output, we are typically criticizing the LLM. Percei…

> I think you actually are, in a very real sense. Someone else would have written different lines of codes. The lines of code are a function of yourself, an inherent part of you. Criticizing the lines of code criticizes that part of you. You can’t criticize a novel without implicitly criticizing its author. When we criticize an LMM’s output, we are typically criticizing the LLM. Perceiving criticism of one’s own work…

Part of this reads as if you're not allowed to be criticized for some reason. How is "I am not a perfect coder" really different from "I'm inherently flawed"? Being flawed just means you're not perfect. People are flawed. Everyone is. One doesn't have to feel bad about it. One only needs to take responsibility for it. And then one can actually feel good about having acted responsibly.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#419
post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uhm...I have to chime in here. "Anti-fragile attitude" when it comes to criticism is not built by tolerance. Quite the opposite actually. It is a common misconception. While making yourself numb against criticism IS a solution but not by far the best one. A high criticism tolerance is learned by understanding that ones self worth is not attached to output or delivery. (This is hard in our industry) It comes from self…

I’ve heard similar statements from other people, and I have a disconnect that prevents me from understanding. Why would someone want to detach their self worth from what they do? If someone ought not feel a negative emotion in response to doing something “bad”, by what logic can they justify feeling something positive in response to doing something “good”? I cannot conceive of a world view that allows one to feel pro…

The pro tip is to attach your self worth not to your skill, but to it's first derivative!

That way any criticism that helps you improve your game, no matter how unpleasantly delivered, is a power up.

I say it glibly, like it's easy, but it works if one can internalize it.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A low self esteem from constant insults (aka non-constructive or overly harshly presented critique) or lack of encouragement will kill anybody's ability to accept useful feedback, and people can certainly become numb to that. However, that numbness is different than being unaccustomed to taking useful critique without getting defensive. Which is absolutely a learned skill– one of the most important you learn early in…

Agreed. The constructive vs insults is the important piece. My senior gives me useful feedback now a regular basis. I explicitly asked him to be as direct with me as he feels is necessary and it did open my eyes to the perception of my presentations among other things. To your point, I still bristle at a random unnecessary insult.

Can you give an example of "insults"? I have to say this line of thinking really bewilders me... perhaps I've never worked in an environment with this kind of toxicity.

Typically the sensitivity level of feedback in my experience has encroached into things like "Don't give 10 comments on a PR, its too many and people feel bad" (regardless of the number of faults in the code).

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