Critical Thinking applied to oneself (i.e.. Introspection)...

[MrKnobs]

... is perhaps our most important duty to humanity.  I got to thinking about this after Craig's post in the SciFi movie thread.   The best movies make us think about things we avoid thinking about, present complex characters painted in shades of gray instead of black & white (sorry, Star Wars and the recent Trek movies too), and expand our perspective.

By introspection I don't mean excessive, pointless introspection (aka narcissism) that can be seen in abundance on nearly any Facebook page ("I like chocolate a lot.. boys suck...I had bacon for breakfast.. I'm lonely today..." etc.).  I'm talking meaningful introspection that most often is not shared with the rest of the world.  "Am I a good person?  Am I working hard enough?  Could I do more?  Am I lying to myself about these "harmless" flirtations with my coworker?  Could I be more loving to my wife and kids?  How can I use what remains of my life to make the world slightly better?  Why do I keep making the same mistakes?"

Too much introspection leads to inaction and paralysis.  Too little introspection leads to pointless ten year wars or costly divorces (Tiger Woods et al), or finding yourself unemployed and unemployable at 50.

I was a university scientist for nearly 30 years.   I used to say the best parts of that job were working with brilliant young minds, being the first person on Earth to learn some new thing, putting a small brick in the wall of human knowledge so that one day life will be better for everyone who comes after.

But today I've added one more thing to that list: critical introspection.  

Every scientist has to constantly defend his or her ideas and work from brutal beatings.  We all stand in front of the huge PowerPoint screen and listen to people politely or impolitely, directly or indirectly tell us what complete idiots we are and how our ideas have set a new milestone for human stupidity and wasted money.  We all get our peer reviewed papers back with tons of red ink on them (red marks in Adobe Acrobat these days) telling us our ideas aren't worth the paper we wasted printing them, let alone the (self) esteemed reviewer's time to read them.

And that is just how it should be.  

If you don't understand something well enough to defend it in terms that even lay people can understand, you don't understand it at all and you have no business presenting it.  As my very wise old professor boss used to say, "If you find yourself pointing to your PhD to defend your work, then we failed you as educators and you shouldn't have been awarded the degree."

In a few years, I went from grinding my teeth at reviews and thinking, "What an idiot!  He must not have read my paper at all!  How did he get that degree without knowing anything?" to "Wow, I hadn't thought of that, or looked at it from that perspective. I need to explain that better if someone in my own field couldn't grasp what I was saying" or, the dreaded but so vitally important, "Wow, he's right and I'm wrong."

Because of that experience I've been humbled and have acquired the life long habit of being less defensive, more thoughtful, less inclined to dismiss people's opinions without considering them, less strident in my assertions lest I eat more crow for it later.   That might be the most important thing I learned in those 30 years.

Some of you might think this post too introspective or even narcissistic.  But hey, I understand your point of view, and that's progress.

Your thoughts? 

Terry D.

 

[Mark L]

This is a very intelligent thread, Terry

Unfortunately, I haven't yet reached the same degree of enlightenment that you seem to have, and I get stung by what I see as 'unfair' criticism

But hey, life's a journey. And there's still time

[MrKnobs]

---

MarkydeSad wrote:

This is a very intelligent thread, Terry

Unfortunately, I haven't yet reached the same degree of enlightenment that you seem to have, and I get stung by what I see as 'unfair' criticism

But hey, life's a journey. And there's still time

---

Thanks for replying and bringing this thread deftly on topic to music!

It's really important for artists of all sorts to handle criticism well.   It's actually a bit easier for artists than scientists as for artists there's no right or wrong answer - just differences in taste.    Some people will love the song you just wrote, some will hate it, most will be indifferent or somewhere in between.  When someone says, "Your song sucks!!"  all he can possibly mean is it's not to his taste.  So what?

With that in mind, there are two categories of songwriters: those who intentionally write for a specific audience and purpose (e. g. adverts, film scores, etc) and those who write for themselves and if anyone else likes it so much the better.   I've done quite a bit of each, with (predictably) a lot more financial success in the former category.  But nothing is as satisfying as writing something that speaks to your own heart and then seeing a lot of other people moved by it as well.

You do that well, sir.  Push on and know that you can never make everyone happy but with 7 billion people on the planet you don't have to hit a very large percentage niche to "succeed," whatever that means to you.  In fact a sure recipe for failure is to try to please everyone.  Invariably, you'll end up pleasing no one and hate the material yourself.  Speak your heart in everything you write!

Having said that, it's very helpful to separate who you are from what you've created - after you've finished it.  Yes, our songs are our "babies" but if you look at them as work you've done and not YOU personally then when people criticize them you can be objective about specific criticisms. 

Was that guy right when he said the song would be better if it was tightened up, made a little shorter?  Is that placement agency guy telling you the truth when he says your song that has the word "Rome" in it will be rejected by any film or TV music director because (in his tiny mind that apparently can't grasp a metaphor) it refers to a specific city?  Does your recording of an actual string quartet sound like a "dated string pad sample" as one reviewer told me?  Is that vocal "organic" or is it simply "off key?"  Does your title song sound like a bad copy of Elanor Rigby as that ignorant idiot wrote when he reviewed your album?  Is your off color language in track 2 of the CD holding you back from a wider group of people hearing your work? 

Recently I attempted to help a new songwriter who I think is brilliant by submitting one of her better songs to two agencies I use for film/tv/ad placement.  I have NEVER in two years seen such a positive response from either agency as she got from her tune.  BUT... they both said the mix has to be better.  I shared their critiques with her and suggested, since she had recorded the tunes at home, by herself, to please send me the stems and let me remix them and resubmit, maybe even rerecord her tune with professional musicians here in Austin - all at my expense with no obligation to me whatsoever.

She was not interested. 

I learned in that one email that she was not serious about her music, or perhaps didn't trust me.   Either way, that was fatal to further collaboration so I smiled and resumed just being pen pals. 

I think this young lady could have a brilliant future in music, if she had taken this small criticism that in no way reflects on her as a songwriter impersonally.   I hope that changes as she has a lot to offer.

When people criticize your work, they're actually trying to help you - even if they don't intend that, even if they're particularly nasty.  It's a free opinion, a free evaluation of your work, a fresh perspective you would not have thought of yourself, and sometimes it's priceless.  And in the end, you can take it or leave it - provided you don't take it personally.

Terry D.

 

 

[nat whilk II]

Really good post, Terry.  Thanks - has me thinking about it.

 

I fall on the side of being naturally too self-critical, too given to self-analysis as a habit of mind.  And in my teens and twenties, I frankly resented what I saw as the great mass of self-satisfied humanity who just drifted along taking no stock of things, assuming their basic "ok-ness", and perceiving people like myself as simply people who worried too much.  

 

There was some truth behind this old habitual attitude of mine, but eventually I decided that pride - the bad sort of pride - was just as much a factor in creating (other's) self-satisfaction as it was in creating (my) excess self-disatisfaction.  Which seems paradoxical or downright contradictory at first blush.  But it works like this:  if you blindly just assume your notions and personality and behaviour are plenty good, that's definitely a damaging, blinding pride of a naive sort.  But if you're constantly self-disatisfied with yourself, it is so often the case that you're driven to having to outscore other people, to be a special, admired case of one thing or another.  Which is another sort of damaging, sneaky and elitist sort of pride.  To just say, "I'm mediocre"  and be ok with that because it's, well, the truth of the matter, is very, very hard for me to do. 

 

I've read a fair amount of the western, monkish, mystical tradition literature, and in that literature, it's repeated quite often that the first step to enlightenment is self-knowledge, and it's devilishly hard to achieve and not really any fun at all.  And never totally accomplished, I might add.

 

nat whilk ii

[rjt]

"The unexamined life is not worth living"--Socrates (through Plato.)

I have had the "joy" of being humbled several times in my life.  The experiences were valid and hard to deny (in the sense they weren't dependent on people's opinions.)  I think they were some of the most valuable experiences of my life and like to think they made me a better person.  In my life there has been criticism leveled fairly/unfairly, detailed/broad and helpful/unhelpful.  The key, for me, is to know the difference.  That isn't always easy.  Good post.

[UstadKhanAli]

---

MrKnobs wrote:

 

But today I've added one more thing to that list: critical introspection.  

 

---

As in:  a realistic appraisal.  Knowing your feelings and thoughts and strengths and weaknesses.  As in determining how you can improve.

As is so often the case, this is achieved most effectively when it's not given to extremes (lack of introspection vs. too much introspection, both of which curiously seem to lead to inaction albeit very very differently ).

[UstadKhanAli]

 

---

rjt wrote:

 

"The unexamined life is not worth living"

--Socrates (through Plato.)

 

I have had the "joy" of being humbled several times in my life.  The experiences were valid and hard to deny (in the sense they weren't dependent on people's opinions.)  I think they were some of the most valuable experiences of my life and like to think they made me a better person.  In my life there has been criticism leveled fairly/unfairly, detailed/broad and helpful/unhelpful. 

The key, for me, is to know the difference.

  That isn't always easy.  Good post.

---

 

Excellent, Ray!!  *Perspective*!! 

How valuable is perspective!!!!!

[Goobers]

---

MrKnobs wrote:

... is perhaps our most important duty to humanity.  I got to thinking about this after Craig's post in the SciFi movie thread.   The best movies make us think about things we avoid thinking about, present complex characters painted in shades of gray instead of black & white (sorry, Star Wars and the recent Trek movies too), and expand our perspective.

By introspection I don't mean excessive, pointless introspection (aka narcissism) that can be seen in abundance on nearly any Facebook page ("I like chocolate a lot.. boys suck...I had bacon for breakfast.. I'm lonely today..." etc.).  I'm talking meaningful introspection that most often is not shared with the rest of the world.  "Am I a good person?  Am I working hard enough?  Could I do more?  Am I lying to myself about these "harmless" flirtations with my coworker?  Could I be more loving to my wife and kids?  How can I use what remains of my life to make the world slightly better?  Why do I keep making the same mistakes?"

Too much introspection leads to inaction and paralysis.  Too little introspection leads to pointless ten year wars or costly divorces (Tiger Woods et al), or finding yourself unemployed and unemployable at 50.

I was a university scientist for nearly 30 years.   I used to say the best parts of that job were working with brilliant young minds, being the first person on Earth to learn some new thing, putting a small brick in the wall of human knowledge so that one day life will be better for everyone who comes after.

But today I've added one more thing to that list: critical introspection.  

Every scientist has to constantly defend his or her ideas and work from brutal beatings.  We all stand in front of the huge PowerPoint screen and listen to people politely or impolitely, directly or indirectly tell us what complete idiots we are and how our ideas have set a new milestone for human stupidity and wasted money.  We all get our peer reviewed papers back with tons of red ink on them (red marks in Adobe Acrobat these days) telling us our ideas aren't worth the paper we wasted printing them, let alone the (self) esteemed reviewer's time to read them.

And that is just how it should be.  

If you don't understand something well enough to defend it in terms that even lay people can understand, you don't understand it at all and you have no business presenting it.  As my very wise old professor boss used to say, "If you find yourself pointing to your PhD to defend your work, then we failed you as educators and you shouldn't have been awarded the degree."

In a few years, I went from grinding my teeth at reviews and thinking, "What an idiot!  He must not have read my paper at all!  How did he get that degree without knowing anything?" to "Wow, I hadn't thought of that, or looked at it from that perspective. I need to explain that better if someone in my own field couldn't grasp what I was saying" or, the dreaded but so vitally important, "Wow, he's right and I'm wrong."

Because of that experience I've been humbled and have acquired the life long habit of being less defensive, more thoughtful, less inclined to dismiss people's opinions without considering them, less strident in my assertions lest I eat more crow for it later.   That might be the most important thing I learned in those 30 years.

Some of you might think this post too introspective or even narcissistic.  But hey, I understand your point of view, and that's progress.

Your thoughts? 

Terry D.

 

---

 

you are a complete idiot and your ideas have set a new milestone for human stupidity and wasted money. pointless introspection about pointless introspection is the type of recursive meta-dribble that has no place in this storied institution. I suggest you begin by redefining your terms, and then resubmitting for the next round 

[MrKnobs]

---

Goobers wrote:

---

MrKnobs wrote:

... is perhaps our most important duty to humanity.  I got to thinking about this after Craig's post in the SciFi movie thread.   The best movies make us think about things we avoid thinking about, present complex characters painted in shades of gray instead of black & white (sorry, Star Wars and the recent Trek movies too), and expand our perspective.

By introspection I don't mean excessive, pointless introspection (aka narcissism) that can be seen in abundance on nearly any Facebook page ("I like chocolate a lot.. boys suck...I had bacon for breakfast.. I'm lonely today..." etc.).  I'm talking meaningful introspection that most often is not shared with the rest of the world.  "Am I a good person?  Am I working hard enough?  Could I do more?  Am I lying to myself about these "harmless" flirtations with my coworker?  Could I be more loving to my wife and kids?  How can I use what remains of my life to make the world slightly better?  Why do I keep making the same mistakes?"

Too much introspection leads to inaction and paralysis.  Too little introspection leads to pointless ten year wars or costly divorces (Tiger Woods et al), or finding yourself unemployed and unemployable at 50.

I was a university scientist for nearly 30 years.   I used to say the best parts of that job were working with brilliant young minds, being the first person on Earth to learn some new thing, putting a small brick in the wall of human knowledge so that one day life will be better for everyone who comes after.

But today I've added one more thing to that list: critical introspection.  

Every scientist has to constantly defend his or her ideas and work from brutal beatings.  We all stand in front of the huge PowerPoint screen and listen to people politely or impolitely, directly or indirectly tell us what complete idiots we are and how our ideas have set a new milestone for human stupidity and wasted money.  We all get our peer reviewed papers back with tons of red ink on them (red marks in Adobe Acrobat these days) telling us our ideas aren't worth the paper we wasted printing them, let alone the (self) esteemed reviewer's time to read them.

And that is just how it should be.  

If you don't understand something well enough to defend it in terms that even lay people can understand, you don't understand it at all and you have no business presenting it.  As my very wise old professor boss used to say, "If you find yourself pointing to your PhD to defend your work, then we failed you as educators and you shouldn't have been awarded the degree."

In a few years, I went from grinding my teeth at reviews and thinking, "What an idiot!  He must not have read my paper at all!  How did he get that degree without knowing anything?" to "Wow, I hadn't thought of that, or looked at it from that perspective. I need to explain that better if someone in my own field couldn't grasp what I was saying" or, the dreaded but so vitally important, "Wow, he's right and I'm wrong."

Because of that experience I've been humbled and have acquired the life long habit of being less defensive, more thoughtful, less inclined to dismiss people's opinions without considering them, less strident in my assertions lest I eat more crow for it later.   That might be the most important thing I learned in those 30 years.

Some of you might think this post too introspective or even narcissistic.  But hey, I understand your point of view, and that's progress.

Your thoughts? 

Terry D.

 

---

 

you are a complete idiot and your ideas have set a new milestone for human stupidity and wasted money. pointless introspection about pointless introspection is the type of recursive meta-dribble that has no place in this storied institution. I suggest you begin by redefining your terms, and then resubmitting for the next round 

---

Oh, I forgot.  There is one type of criticism that's totally devoid of information: the joke.

I translate this to "I like you"

Thanks! 

Edit:  Maybe your comment (other than warming my heart) is not so useless after all.  You reminded me of a story that sheds light on another key facet of accepting criticism: first, you have to understand it!

There's a short SciFi story called "The Language Compactor."  I'm sorry to say I don't remember the author's name.   It's about as perfect and terse as a short SF story can be, IMO.

The gist of the story is that a genius guy invents a little machine where you insert a big, multipage, complex document into one end and, after a little churning and lights flashing, out the other end comes a simple one page translation in clear, easy to understand English.  The inventor believes that he's going to be rich, but after shopping it around all over no one wants to buy it. 

As a last recourse, he takes his device to a huge law firm and of course they are the least interested until one of the lawyers, toying with the unit, stuffs a page into the output slot and to everyone's surprise the machine churns and out comes a giant stack of paper full of completely incomprehensible legalese.  The lawyers do a happy dance and they buy the prototype machine, with a promise to buy many more.

The little inventor guy is happy and he sets to work setting up a production line.

However, the next day he finds a very official looking letter in his mailbox, from the Pentagon.  The little inventor guy can't understand the obscure document (maybe he owes some taxes?) so he puts it in the language compactor.  The machine grinds for a bit, then spits out a page with a single sentence on it.  It reads, "Stop making this thing or we'll kill you."

So, the moral of this story, going back to Goober's post is to benefit from criticism you have to first wade through a bunch of confusing crap.  And sometimes.. the meaning is obscure on purpose.

Terry D.

[RockViolin]

---

MrKnobs wrote:

... is perhaps our most important duty to humanity.  I got to thinking about this after Craig's post in the SciFi movie thread.   The best movies make us think about things we avoid thinking about, present complex characters painted in shades of gray instead of black & white (sorry, Star Wars and the recent Trek movies too), and expand our perspective.

By introspection I don't mean excessive, pointless introspection (aka narcissism) that can be seen in abundance on nearly any Facebook page ("I like chocolate a lot.. boys suck...I had bacon for breakfast.. I'm lonely today..." etc.).  I'm talking meaningful introspection that most often is not shared with the rest of the world.  "Am I a good person?  Am I working hard enough?  Could I do more?  Am I lying to myself about these "harmless" flirtations with my coworker?  Could I be more loving to my wife and kids?  How can I use what remains of my life to make the world slightly better?  Why do I keep making the same mistakes?"

Too much introspection leads to inaction and paralysis.  Too little introspection leads to pointless ten year wars or costly divorces (Tiger Woods et al), or finding yourself unemployed and unemployable at 50.

I was a university scientist for nearly 30 years.   I used to say the best parts of that job were working with brilliant young minds, being the first person on Earth to learn some new thing, putting a small brick in the wall of human knowledge so that one day life will be better for everyone who comes after.

But today I've added one more thing to that list: critical introspection.  

Every scientist has to constantly defend his or her ideas and work from brutal beatings.  We all stand in front of the huge PowerPoint screen and listen to people politely or impolitely, directly or indirectly tell us what complete idiots we are and how our ideas have set a new milestone for human stupidity and wasted money.  We all get our peer reviewed papers back with tons of red ink on them (red marks in Adobe Acrobat these days) telling us our ideas aren't worth the paper we wasted printing them, let alone the (self) esteemed reviewer's time to read them.

And that is just how it should be.  

If you don't understand something well enough to defend it in terms that even lay people can understand, you don't understand it at all and you have no business presenting it.  As my very wise old professor boss used to say, "If you find yourself pointing to your PhD to defend your work, then we failed you as educators and you shouldn't have been awarded the degree."

In a few years, I went from grinding my teeth at reviews and thinking, "What an idiot!  He must not have read my paper at all!  How did he get that degree without knowing anything?" to "Wow, I hadn't thought of that, or looked at it from that perspective. I need to explain that better if someone in my own field couldn't grasp what I was saying" or, the dreaded but so vitally important, "Wow, he's right and I'm wrong."

Because of that experience I've been humbled and have acquired the life long habit of being less defensive, more thoughtful, less inclined to dismiss people's opinions without considering them, less strident in my assertions lest I eat more crow for it later.   That might be the most important thing I learned in those 30 years.

Some of you might think this post too introspective or even narcissistic.  But hey, I understand your point of view, and that's progress.

Your thoughts? 

Terry D.

 

---

Lucky me, I believe I can be caught giving critical, introspective review of one of my own posts in said thread. Whew. 

Balance in all things. 'Tis neither good to have your head in the clouds, nor up your ass. Yup.

I too come from a world where what one does is naked before all. Fail to keep your house in order and it will be quickly addressed in front of 40 - 100+ colleagues. Should it happen in concert, in front of several thousand people, it is humbling beyond belief, and with no hole deep enough to crawl into, one can even have to remain onstage for quite some time wearing the shame, while your colleagues, the friendly ones, try not to look, and the not so friendly have a small party in your honor, on stage. I've even seen the partiers screw up do to their the wanton schadenfreud too! Anyway, even with a track record of hundreds of prior spotless shows, just one such event can mean weeks, even months, years of rebuilding the confidence of one's peers, and in oneself. It can be quite literally curtains, even. But of course, nobody is perfect, people do get tired, let their guard down, and clunkers happen. Reputation helps a lot at that point.

I wonder if it isn't possible to find yourself in an easily pot-shot-able situation though, having committed no error other than having chosen to go right, instead of left. And in retracing your steps you find where you should have gone left, but there was no way of knowing then which way to go. Or to suffer consequences largely brought on by someone else's mistakes, their life briefly intersecting yours just long enough to change it forever. 

 Neither here nor there really, but I played under a conductor who was so jilted by a review that he told the critic not to come to the shows anymore. There were no more reviews for the duration. 

[Lee Knight]

Over at the Songwriting Workshop Forum, a subforum here at HC, we deal with criticism. A lot. We even changed the name of the forum to Songwriting Workshop. The whole idea being we workshop works in progress. WIP. We don't do a lot of "attaboys". Nor do we do any "boy this sucks". 

 

We try and help each other create better work. 

 

Now, in order to help, you need first assess what is in need of help.  And that is basically constructive criticism. It requires responsibility to constructively criticize. It takes work and honesty.

 

"The verses work great but the chorus just sort of lays there. Have you considered a bit more dense melodic rhythm when you sing the hook phrase to contrast with the verse's more laid back melodic rhythm? And maybe more repetition of the hook phrase itself. Like so..."

 

And then the one whose work is being criticized needs to process that info. As Craig says, paraphrasing, "I'm under no obligation to agree." But it always pays to digest it. To assess the perspective of the critic.

 

AND TO ASSESS OUR INTENTIONS WITH THE WORK

 

A lot of times the help being provided is misguided due to a misunderstanding of what the intentions are of the writer and his piece. in turn, the creator of the work needs focus on what their intentions are exactly. It makes it a hell of lot more efficient in recognizing helpful suggestions when you know who you want to be and what you want to create.

 

And then you move forward with an open mind and ear, and focus of what it is you want.

[JeffLearman]

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Goobers wrote:

you are a complete idiot and your ideas have set a new milestone for human stupidity and wasted money.

You beat me to it! I was going to add, "and you're a wordy bugger, too."

Hi Knobs!

 

Anyway, Goobers wins the race to the bottom.