A Piece of Advice to New Woodworkers: Stop Pointing Out…
0 reactions
A Piece of Advice to New Woodworkers: Stop Pointing Out Your Mistakes
Intermediate woodworker here with a piece of advice to new-ish woodworkers (and some long-time ones too) that took me ages to figure out: stop pointing out your mistakes when talking about your projects.
I have a terrible case of Imposter Syndrome -- you know, that thing where low confidence in your skill or job makes you think you're a fraud and one day, someone's going to tell the whole world that you have no idea what you're doing. For most of us, this is absolutely not true, yet we still believe it about ourselves.
When I started woodworking, I knew that I was racking up experience with projects, but I could still only see the disappointments, or the places where I screwed up. So, when someone would ask me about my projects, I would endeavor to point out these mistakes to assert that I was not, in fact, an expert woodworker.
If you do this too, stop doing it.
I've come to realize that 95 percent of the time, *no one would have noticed it if I hadn't pointed it out*. Most people are impressed with even beginner-quality woodworking skills, and you should let them be impressed. If they ask about it, be honest about your feelings, but don't go out of your way to highlight how much you think it sucks.
In worst-case scenarios, you might even be giving implicit direction for someone to be overly-critical of your work, since you're the one who brought it up.
Now, this doesn't mean you should deflect or push back against fair criticism of your work; it just means you don't have to be the one to highlight what you see as your flaws. Take the compliment and feel good about your work.
#diy
source
Intermediate woodworker here with a piece of advice to new-ish woodworkers (and some long-time ones too) that took me ages to figure out: stop pointing out your mistakes when talking about your projects.
I have a terrible case of Imposter Syndrome -- you know, that thing where low confidence in your skill or job makes you think you're a fraud and one day, someone's going to tell the whole world that you have no idea what you're doing. For most of us, this is absolutely not true, yet we still believe it about ourselves.
When I started woodworking, I knew that I was racking up experience with projects, but I could still only see the disappointments, or the places where I screwed up. So, when someone would ask me about my projects, I would endeavor to point out these mistakes to assert that I was not, in fact, an expert woodworker.
If you do this too, stop doing it.
I've come to realize that 95 percent of the time, *no one would have noticed it if I hadn't pointed it out*. Most people are impressed with even beginner-quality woodworking skills, and you should let them be impressed. If they ask about it, be honest about your feelings, but don't go out of your way to highlight how much you think it sucks.
In worst-case scenarios, you might even be giving implicit direction for someone to be overly-critical of your work, since you're the one who brought it up.
Now, this doesn't mean you should deflect or push back against fair criticism of your work; it just means you don't have to be the one to highlight what you see as your flaws. Take the compliment and feel good about your work.
#diy
source
| 3,000 mlx | |
| 4 | |
| 0 |