Fuck you, I’m the worst, okay let’s think about it — the stages of receiving feedback

This came from the actor Bradley Whitford when talking to Marc Maron (quoted from this Financial Times article).

“If I’m honest, anytime any director has ever said anything to me, I go through three silent beats: Fuck you. I suck. OK, what?” He added: “I really believe that that is a universal response and some people get stuck on ‘I suck’. You know people who live there. Some people live on ‘Fuck you’. Most people pretty quick get to the [third stage].” I realised that while Laurence said the third stage was “Let’s make it better”, Whitford’s original was the more ambiguous “Okay, what?”

I’ve since passed on this nugget to lots of people both in

a) recognising the stages they too may go through when getting feedback.

but also

b) taking these stages into account when delivering feedback.

We’re all meant to be obsessed with giving and receiving feedback but I think its important to acknowledge how hard it is to get through those first two stages. If you feel like someone is attacking you its not great for the relationship and easy to stay on stage one. If you’re prone to self-hatred or impostor syndrome its really hard to get past that second level.

Actually getting to a place where you’re open to thinking about what to do with the feedback is filled with effort so feedback can be very useful but its definitely not free.