On Handling Critique

For a long time I believed that I could do whatever I would find right, and it didn't matter what others thought of it. What I can't say, is that it was always easy to do so. Many times I was getting that bothersome feeling that something wasn't right in what I've done or said. And since I strongly believed there was nothing wrong, that feeling has riddled me for ages.

After I was thinking about it today, it has suddenly dawned on me, that all these years I've been looking at things incorrectly, and in fact it was all the other way round. While I shouldn't have been bothered by doing things I believed in and people have found strange or wrong, before acting, I should have taken into consideration not only the logical rightness of that saying or activity, but also the way people would look at it, and its consequences. There are many things that the society considers to be wrong, with that being the only reason not to do them, which I consider to be stupid and incorrect inhibitions to follow. But, sometimes, it is better not to stick out when there is no underlying ideological reason, because many people won't understand, and the harm might be more significant than the gain.

Efficient timeout

Did you ever notice how much you can sometimes learn by stopping doing something for a while?

Occasionally, when I skip a workout or two at the gym, I notice that the weight I can handle improved pretty seriously. Today, after a little period of not playing the guitar, perhaps my playing ability didn't change much, but I discovered a comfortable position on my chair after deciding that I must get a more comfortable chair for playing.

I'm usually using my computer chair to play. The problem is that it has arm rests that don't allow me to sit with the guitar while resting my back. Today, after using this chair for almost a year, I discovered that I could sit diagonally :)

It's interesting how breaking the routine can allow us to gain new... uhmm... strengths? :)