Four kinds of criticism. Correct criticism from the right heart- embrace it, course correct, thank the person. Incorrect criticism from the right heart- thank the person but humbly clear the confusion. Correct criticism from the wrong heart- separate the content of the criticism from the attitude of the person, course correct yourself, don’t allow your heart to be wounded by the idiot.

And finally, incorrect criticism from a wrong attitude and heart. This is where you hit the delete button.

I say hit the delete button because this criticism often comes in the form of anonymous emails, tweets, blog comments, and other forms of technological warfare. I recently received an email that was horrific. Anything a person could possibly attack about me was attacked. Except for nose. Had they mentioned something about the prominence of my nose, that would have been correct. It was personal and it was vicious. It also got very silly. Stuff along the lines of, “and your shirt was ugly.” Okay it didn’t actually say that, but close.

Delete.

Sometimes, we have trouble discerning whether the criticism is valid or invalid. That’s where having trusted accountability can be helpful. Several years ago, I gave a talk at my first women’s conference. It was well received. With the exception of one girl. She cornered me in the lunch room immediately after to express her concerns. She accused me of being disingenuous when I encouraged people and systematically listed out for me a litany of my relational faults. I just stood there in a state of shock. There are lots of things you can attack about my abilities and my character. But my desire to see potential in people, call it out of them, and encourage people is just not one of them. I genuinely want to see people grow into their potential.  And her attitude was just bad.

I thanked her for verbalizing her thoughts but told her I disagreed.  I also told her I would take her comments to some other people to solicit their honest feedback…just in case it was a blind spot. I talked with four different girls who knew me well, knew me in very different contexts, and would be honest with me. They all said the criticism was incorrect.

My new challenge was to ignore the criticism and not allow the attitude of the person to affect the way I related to them. Because unlike the anonymous idiots, this was an idiot I had to see on a regular basis.

Wrong criticism from a wrong heart. Don’t waste time on it. Delete. If it’s from someone in your community, do your due diligence and seek second and third opinions. But if it’s incorrect, don’t dwell on it. Don’t internalize it. Move on.