A critical point

Life is like a thin guy with a paunch.

*pause*

I'M KIDDING!!!!

This is not going to be another one of those apparently annoying analogy posts from the artificial and contrived production line of Sayesha's blog!!!!

Calm down, people! CALM DOWN!!!!!! WOULD YOU PLEASE CALM DOWN!

IT WAS A JOKE!!! This post is not an analogy post!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I SAY CALM DOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(Ok, it looks like I'm the one who needs to calm down. Everyone else is already calm.)

Breathe, Sayesha, breathe.

Phew.

Okay. I'm done.

Pardon me if I am a bit dotty today. The person I admire the most in my professional life just left my company, and although I'd been mentally preparing for this day, when it actually happened, it was very upsetting. This person taught me to fall in love with my job. And I don't feel like working there anymore.

Sigh. She said she needed a break.

And so do I.

First things first. Two of 'em:

1. I am not even going to try and shake off the reputation I seem to have with some people. Of someone whose blog posts (and hence, thoughts, since a post is but a thought) are contrived and artificial. Or someone who can’t take criticism. You think what you think, and I can’t change it.

2. I will not pretend to be someone who's not affected at all by criticism. No matter how thick-skinned my blog has made me, every time someone says something spiteful, it does pinch a bit. Thankfully, for a short while only.

So what is this post about? It's about criticism. Before you start thinking of me as someone who's never faced criticism before and is hence taking all the blog criticism so seriously, let me tell you something. Criticism is something I am familiar with, not just on my blog, but at my work.

I have to criticise the work of authors twice my age. I have to criticise the work of editors under me. Sometimes I have to criticise comments made by the Ministry of Education. To ensure that my magazine is of the highest quality, I have to criticise the work of my designers, my illustrators. Sometimes, I have to criticise my boss' decisions. It’s difficult, but the fact that I have been at the receiving end helps a lot. Besides, my bosses have trained me well.

When I was training under my senior editor in 2003, every single piece of my work went to her for approval. And most of it was torn apart. And I remember never even once getting frustrated when things would be sent back without her signature, with comments and criticisms all over the place, and often asking for redrafts and more redrafts.

Why?

Because I knew she knew her stuff. And because of the manner in which she criticised.

And here are the mantras of criticism my bosses taught me:

1. Criticise the work, not the person.
2. Praise in public, criticise in private.
3. Remember the point of your criticism. Not for you to show how you're superior to your editor. But to work together to create a good book.
4. You can only get an author twice your age to trust your criticism about his/her book if you can prove your knowledge.

That's the whole point of criticism actually. To know what you’re talking about. To add value. To come up with something meaningful. Something constructive.

Everything else is just spite.

If you’re putting your heart and soul into something, it hurts when someone criticises. Especially when the criticism does not add any value to anything. We’re all proud of the stuff we do. No one likes to be told they suck at what they love to do. Unless it comes from someone who’s been there done that, or someone who helps in some way with his/her criticism.

Once I was at dinner with my colleagues and when the bill came, the person who did the division made an error, giving us a ridiculous figure. Someone said, "And you’re a Maths editor!” And the rest of us laughed. In retrospect, it was a mean thing to say. We just assumed that because she was a Maths editor, she would be able to do mental maths and tell us the magic figure. We’d just criticised her professional competence. We’d made a personal attack on something she was proud of. And we had not added any value to her.

I remember the time when I had freshly graduated as an engineer, and had gone home for a vacation when our TV conked out.

Dad said, “Can you open it up and check what’s wrong?”

“What??? Me?? Open up the TV??” I looked at him in horror.

"But you’re an Electrical and Electronics Engineer!”

He was joking, of course. He just wanted to see the look of horror on my face, but the point is -- we don't like being criticised about what we do. Or to have someone tell us that we're not good enough.

Many people think that being an editor is all about good english and no typos.

Bah, I say.

Three years into publishing, I am still learning to be a good editor. I believe I have only accomplished a slice of what there is to be learnt in the full spectrum.

Have you seen the number of typos I make, especially when I'm particularly excited in a post? Once I spelt 'discreet' as 'discrete' without even realising it. An anonymous kind soul on my blog pointed it out to me.

Without judging me.

Without saying that I suck as an editor just because I can't control my typos. (Anonymous, if you're reading this, thank you. I am really grateful to you.)

Perhaps that’s the reason why I'm not very open to anonymous people strolling by my blog and criticising my posts in a way that adds value to neither them nor me. It appears as if it just gives them cheap thrills to see me riled up. And I get riled up because I believe that if you have the right to lash at me, I SO have the right to lash back at you.

It's amazing how I can walk around on the streets with really weird thoughts in my head, and none's gonna say a word to me, but the moment I choose to put them down on my own blog, I have set myself up for vicious attacks.

I refuse to write only 'safe posts' just so people will not criticise. Do we only think 'safe thoughts'?

I don't blog to 'improve my writing skills'. I don't blog to earn money. I have no plans to enter the blogging Olympics. I won't apologise for the following analogy. I'm like that really bad tennis player who is not Sharapova but plays tennis only for exercise. So don't come and tell me that I can't play tennis for nuts. I know that. And I’m not even really looking into improving my game because I have no desire to turn professional. Ever. Like I said, I play for exercise. No matter how much I suck. But if you want to help me improve my game, you’d better be a friend of mine or Sharapova herself. I will not let random stranger off the roads who's never played tennis, come and tell me I suck at tennis. I already know I suck at it.

Perhaps that's why I am more open to criticism from people who are either bloggers themselves, or those who fall under the category 'Others' and are regulars on my blog, people whom I know, rather than Anonymous people who just walk by and say some random thing. Trust me, you have to be a blogger to know what we go through. You can’t just sit in your commentator’s high chair and say, “Come on Sayesha! Take a chill pill! You only want people to pat you on the back and tell you that you’re the goddess of blogging and more? Learn to accept criticism!” These words, coming from you guys, who have never been-there-done-that, are hollow and meaningless, though they may sound really mature and impressive.

Like I mentioned in my earlier post, if someone on the streets walks up to me and says, "You suck!" what's the best thing to do?

Ignore him. That's right. But like I said before, I do not ignore any commentator on my blog. I have to say something in reply to his/her comment, even though I do not know him/her. I will laugh it off. But only if you meant it as a joke.

Suppose someone like one of my chatur chaar or Kini (he tells me all the time that he yawns at most of my posts and can never get thru an entire post) or Spammy (he’s blunt and sharp at the same time!) say "Sayesha, your post sucks!" I will either take it that they meant it as a joke and laugh it off (after of course, thwacking them with a rolled up newspaper), or really take a step back and wonder why they said that, and try and improve. But if I don't even know you, and I don't even know whether you're joking or just being spiteful, I won't laugh! I'll just ask you to stop reading my blog.

A good debate is always welcome. Prince and I had a good debate when he thought I was judging polar bear researchers. Negative Creep, The Girl who sold the world, and some others had a very good debate on tradition. Now that's welcome. Tell me you don't agree with my post, it's fine. Let's talk about it. But if you just want to say that my post is artificial, what do you want me to reply? "I deeply apologise"? Or “Thank you?”? Think about it, what should be my reply? Seriously. Don’t ask me to chill. Cos like I said, if you have the right to lash at me, how can you expect me to be all dignified and not lash back at you?

The point is -- if your comment is going to be random and meaninglessly critical, you'd either be Virdi (sorry yaar Virdi, lekin seriously, you can get away with saying a lot of things to me and I won’t mind, apun ki dosti hi aisi hai) and or you'd better identify yourself.

Believe me when I say it, it makes a difference.

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ps: I have decided to take a break from blogging. No, not because of Aslam's/Creep's comments or because I can't handle criticism or because I have lost the battle against MACs or because Anonymous comments scare me (if that was the case, I'd either disallow anonymous comments or turn on comment moderation).

I am taking a break because my blogging is no longer the simple pleasure it used to be.

I am taking a break because the reason why I created the blog seems to have been lost. And I need to find it again. I need to start thinking once again about the point of my blog.

I am taking a break because I am tired of having to justify why I am the way I am. I shouldn't have to justify. This is me. Take me or leave me.

I will not be coming back for a while, not even to reply to comments.

And oh, please feel free to judge me some more. Because I won’t be around to care.