Isn’t criticism good because it makes us humble?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Criticism isn’t useful in showing us where we are yes definitely the extent we get agitated by criticism we can understand that we are conditioned at the same time the process of Bhakti is a culture of affection so it is for me to try to say become humble I should try to be humble but if somebody insults me and he says I am helping you to become humble this is a complete perversion of the philosophy so it is not that by insulting me or by criticizing me others are helping me to become humble now humility doesn’t if somebody insults me somebody criticizes me that will not lead to humility that will lead to humiliation see humility and humiliation what is the difference? humility is false ego rejected humiliation is false ego frustrated so I want to be proud but I can’t be proud then I feel humiliated whereas humility means that I consciously choose that there is a better way to live than to live for the praise of others I can live for Krishna’s satisfaction in the remembrance of Krishna I can be happy so humility is a choice that has to be consciously made and criticism we may say it makes me humble but actually it makes us humiliated later on we can choose to become humble by that criticism but criticism itself cannot make anyone humble criticism only hurts the ego primarily but if the person is proactive or person is mature person will say ok this was a mistake I committed let me correct myself let me take the humble position so as devotees if somebody criticizes me I can take it in that way Krishna is helping me to become humble through this devotee that is good but I should not criticize others thinking that I am helping them to become humble that will be a complete misunderstanding misapplication of the philosophy so the the problem with criticism is that it is essential and it reveals to us who we are at the same time it can be very demoralizing because we are human beings there was a survey done in one American university they had a group of art students boys and girls they are studying art and they are planning to become writers so the boys formed a writers club and they said that whatever we write we will all point out faults in others writings and by that we will correct ourselves and we will become better writers when the girls came to know about this the girls also they had some feminist influence so they said we will do the opposite of what the boys did so they said whatever we write we will find the good points and we will praise it and 20 years down the line researchers observed these two groups so among the boys not one of them had become a professional writer three of them they used to write but still they were not good writers and most of them would get fear whenever they start writing on the other hand among the girls overall the boys and the girls they may have been in the same class more or less similar IQ level but among the girls one of them had become a world famous writer six of them had become published writers and all the others were known among their friends as good writers even if they were writing letters or emails or whatever so what this means is that actually for bringing out the good within us we need appreciation more than criticism where criticism also is required but encouragement is what we primarily need and in an atmosphere of encouragement if a little criticism is given that is good but if the primary mode of the relationship is criticism only then people become discouraged so what happens especially in the case of bhakti see bhakti is a voluntary activity and although from the spiritual perspective it is essential we don’t feel it is essential if I go to work and my boss criticizes me I still have to keep working because it is my bread and butter over there but if I come to the temple and somebody criticizes me then I may just give up bhakti because I don’t consider bhakti as mandatory and bhakti is primarily a voluntary activity I was just in another temple a few days ago and I gave a whole three lecture seminar on cultivating non-judgmental attitude so after that one mataji came and she told that she is from Bengali background so Bengali is often the shakta so they take meat but they also they also have affection for the deities she had come to the temple and she was making garland for the deities and as she was making garland for the deities someone came and asked her do you eat meat? she said yes so that person just took the garland and threw it on the ground you can never make garland for the deities she felt devastated she went there crying she just couldn’t digest it it is her sincerity that in spite of that she kept coming and she has become a devotee but it may be true that for the deities we may have that you have to follow certain standards but there is a way to communicate these things and if we are insensitive then we are doing a great disservice to people so the fact that she wanted to make garlands means she has some service attitude that service attitude is good there may be some standards she is not following that has to be told and that can be adjusted but criticism often rather than the mistake is rather than pointing out okay this is the particular action she is doing which should not be done but what happened was by throwing away the garland what was done was she herself felt rejected and her service attitude was rejected so if a soul wants to serve Krishna to reject the service attitude of the soul is actually spiritual violence so it is better to err on the side of caution than on the side of correction now people will learn through mistakes but if they find devotees are very critical they will give up the service attitude itself if they have a service attitude they will gradually correct themselves but if they lose the service attitude then there is no scope for correcting themselves so while dealing with others it is better to err on the side of caution than on the side of correction and correction needs to be given in the atmosphere of affection