Hi there --

I am insecure about who I am, so I am very sensitive to criticism.

My parents were critical, but they were doing the best they could, and they honestly didn't mean anything by it. I also can see that I have a very good legacy of decency and good genes from them, too.

A lot of people do not know how to deliver criticism so that it is tactful and helpful. One way is the so-called sandwich method. Say something nice. Follow it up with a specific example that is an "I" statement. Then suggest how someone can improve the product (not who they are) so that the work is "even better than it already is."

It's often said that the ways that people criticize us tells more about them.

Example -- Last weekend, a woman cut me off in her big SUV in a parking lot. As I tried to maneuver around her, she signalled me to roll down my window. She started complaining about how I'd endangered her child daughter who was trying to get out of the car, but was in fact still in the car at the time.

I told her she had been driving too aggressively and should take better care of her daughter, if that was her concern.

She continued to yell at me, and was still standing in the center of the parking lot row shouting the word "Crazy" after me.

Now, who is crazy? The person who calmly ends such an exchange and drives off, or the one who is yelling "Crazy" in the parking lot? Still, I had a good half-hour of introspection afterward, wondering about whether I'd done wrong. And I bet she never had a moment of self-examination.

I hope I'm not hijacking your thread. It is hard to deal with criticism for some of us, but we have to remember that we are not always the ones who are wrong, other people have their own issues and defects, and move on.