Our words have power. Don’t ignore that, not even for one tiny second. Our words can inspire greatness. But they can also tear each other down. Whether we’re aware of it or not, whatever we put out there, whether we’re typing or texting or speaking, echoes into the eternal, and those echoes can either flourish or fester.
We can be haters or we can be change
A friend of mine published her first book. A deeply enchanting, enthralling, magical book. A book that drew tears when I finished reading it because I was so damn proud of her. A book that drew such spiteful remarks from a stranger on social media that my heart stopped cold.
This abusive critic lashed out in every direction. The critic said it was evident that the development process was rushed. It wasn’t. I watched my friend pour years of her life into this book. The critic said the author failed to write from the heart. She didn’t. I saw how she bled onto the page. The critic even said the book was filled with poor sentence structure. It isn’t. My friend is a highly respected journalist and a fellow writer I admire and look up to.
And even though every criticism was utterly unjustified, even though my friend knew, on an intellectual level, that all this was just spiteful rubbish, she was still hurt. Doubt in her own talent suddenly flared. I had never, never seen her doubt before.
It got me thinking about haters. And why they hate. This stranger’s review wasn’t the tiniest bit helpful. Not to the author, not even to potential readers. So what is it then? Do haters think that, in embodying the scathing critic, it shows some kind of higher intelligence? That it makes them better than the rest of us? It doesn’t. Trust me.
Please, please think before you criticise
Anytime anyone of us cares deeply about something, we make ourselves vulnerable. Whether it’s writing a book, raising a child, baking a cake, or doing our jobs. Hell, sometimes all it takes is stepping out the front door or posting a selfie to make ourselves vulnerable.
And that vulnerability opens ourselves to haters. What we do, what we wear, how we look, how much we weigh … it’s all open to random attack.
Sometimes haters just come with the job. For us writers, in fact for artists of all kinds, we are particularly aware of the intense vulnerability born through the act of pouring our souls into a project and releasing it into the world. It’s just something we have to accept as part of the job, and we have to learn how to deal with rejection in healthier ways.
But that still doesn’t mean it’s okay for people to spew fountains of abuse.
The truth is that abusive critics are lazy
Because it’s so easy to be the critic. Especially on social media. It is so easy to be mean and abusive, to blindly strike wounds and wrench delicate dreams apart. And it only takes seconds.
What isn’t so easy is to inspire people. To light fires in their souls. To help them breathe life into their dreams. That is a far more powerful skill.
So no, nasty critics are definitely not more intelligent than the rest of us. They are not better than the rest of us. They’re lazy. In it, I assume, for a fleeting, superficial rush or twisted validation of some kind.
I’m human too. And there aren’t always flowers coming out of my mouth. When provoked, my fury can be frightening. When I’m not being conscious, I can also say stupid and hurtful things. So I do the work in between the messiness, I try to be conscious and present, to be my kinder, more thoughtful self. I like her infinitely better. And I never go out of my way to intentionally hurt someone.
To the critics, I say dare to do the self-work instead. Dare to heal. Yourself first, and then others. Create your own beauty. Make wings. Fly.
And if you really want to rant about something …
You want to rant about something? Find a cause. Be a voice for those who can’t speak. Because we all shape the world around us. All of us. We can create worlds with our words, so beautiful we’d carve them into our own skin.
This is the kind of world I want to live in.
Don’t you?
