Week 3 - Feedback Thoughts
The first article I read is from ideas.ted.com, which talks about the reason we feel so bad about rejection and what leads us to feel so terrible. I was interested to read about this because some days rejection really can get me down and other days it's so simple to brush it off. It's all according to how everything else is going, I assume.
The article says that our brains react to rejection the same way we react to physical pain. To add to this pain, we also continue to kick ourselves when we're down. Though it's not discussed here, I feel that another reason as to why we beat ourselves up further is because we need to justify everything that happens to us. We search for reasons and answers. It's a further coping mechanism.
The suggestions are quite helpful but for me, I've found that reminding myself that the rejection isn't about me is most helpful. For example, if I submitted a game idea and was told it was bad. That doesn't mean I'm a terrible, uncreative loser. It means the idea was bad. The person reading it didn't like it. It didn't fit the brief. It wasn't detailed enough. Whatever it is, it's rarely because you are useless or whatever else you convince yourself of.
The next article I read is from spencerarticle.com which talks about overcoming self doubt. I found with moving everything online that I really struggled with my own self doubt. When we got to last year's assignments, lecturers were hard to find to get feedback from and I felt so lost because I received no direction or feedback. For all I knew, I was asked to paint a picture and I cooked a meal instead. There was nothing I could make sense of.
I found what was most helpful was getting feedback from college friends and my family - two differing opinions. It meant it covered all sides. The first tip is to not compare yourself to others and though I agree this is dangerous, I don't think you should avoid discussion about your self doubts with others altogether. It can give you direction or purpose.
Another tip I really tried to use last year was to abandon perfectionism. I'm not going to love every brief I receive, every client I work with or even every piece of work I create - there's no way I could. But if I can look at it from a different perspective then it could be closer to perfect than I realise. It fits the brief, it follows the style, it's the right sizes - whatever is needed, if it's met then it's met. I can't love everything I create, especially if it's beyond being a hobby.
I found both articles very helpful and it made me reflect on what went wrong last year and what can be changed this year to get the best of my work but to not be so down about it either.
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