Don't Criticize Yourself and Blow Your Relationship

All of us have real or imagined shortcomings. One of the biggest mistakes we make in relationships is to bring attention to our shortcomings. Why would we do something so self-destructive? How much time we spend talking about our real or imagined short-comings is up to each person.

We experience our short-comings as threats to our self-esteem. Threats mean anxiety. Thus, we criticize ourselves, experience anxiety, and then make things worse by attempting to dust off that anxiety by talking, sometimes talking often, about our imperfections. What's particularly self-destructive about operating this way, is that often the other person-the one we want to be attracted to us-often has not even noticed the feature we are so focused on. Let's take a physical feature. A woman thinks her rear is too large. Over dinner on their third date, she says as much to her new man, thinking that to be close to someone every thought should be shared. He hadn't noticed anything usual about his view of her when she's walking away...but you can bet where his eyes are going to go the very first time the woman gets up and walks away from the table.

This is not to suggest that we never share our fears. Of course we do, well into a relationship, when non-judgmental commitment has been made. Still, in a relationship, even a long-term marriage, if one person uses the relationship as a place to dump fears and self-complaints, even the best relationship will wear down and become more distant.