Criticism: Many of us have heard that criticism is feedback, yet experiencing criticism from self or others can be a different experience all together. We each perceive, receive and respond to criticism in various ways, depending on who it has come from, the value we place upon that persons opinion, and how we have represented the situation or context that we experienced it in. These are all variables and our responses can range from mild to the extreme and can manifest over time, both internally and externally. Through learning and experiencing particular NLP processes, you can have choice over how you respond and represent the criticism.
A useful approach when experiencing criticism is to step out of the situation (within your mind) and look at the encounter from a dissociated position, as if you were an observer, with no emotional involvement. From here you could imagine the other person (giving the criticism) in cartoon form, or with an amusing voice. This may affect the intensity of the experience to be more useful for you and assist in your own state management. You can now assess for yourself, in a resourceful and dissociated state, and determine what you would like to take from this experience. You can assess if the criticism is valid in your opinion, relevant, useful and worth consideration. You may consider what you could learn from this now and use this in future encounters. Developing this ability will allow you to do this in real time in any given situation.
