I Don't Know What to Say, The Gift of Compliments, and Thank You

“I can live for two months on a good compliment.” ~ Mark Twain

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Do you have a hard time accepting a compliment? Do you find yourself saying, “Oh, it was nothing”?

Check out these examples of how people often respond to compliments:

Let’s say you just finished an article for work. Your boss stops by and says, “You did a great job on that story.” You respond:

• Oh, it wasn’t a big deal.

• It wasn’t me. It was the whole team.

• Oh, haha. Yup. Sometimes I can pull it off.

• Oh, it wasn’t me. It was because of the way you laid out the assignment for me.

• Oh, it wasn’t that special. Anyone could have done it.

Any of these sound familiar? Maybe it’s not a work compliment. Maybe it’s about your golf or tennis game (Oh, I just got a couple of lucky shots), or the new recipe you tried (oh, I just followed the directions… I usually burn stuff), or your outfit (Oh, that’s old…from Costco years ago).

If that’s you (it’s me…), you’re not alone. A Boston study of 400 people found that 70% of the participants were uncomfortable or even embarrassed when they received a compliment.

I thought this percentage might be high, but after some digging, discovered that an estimated 85% of people experience some form of low self-esteem. (If you’re interested in more statistics on self esteem, you can read them here.)

According to one study, people with low self esteem were more likely to have trouble accepting compliments. It’s an odd (and sad) paradox, but when someone thinks poorly of themselves, they have a hard time hearing praise because it contradicts what they believe. Humans can be complicated!

Psychologist Guy Winch says that people with low self esteem have an especially difficult time accepting compliments from their partners because they don’t feel worthy, or they are afraid that they won’t be able to live up to the expectations of the compliment and their partners will reject them.

Because of this fear, they typically respond negatively to compliments from their partners. Sadly this can trigger exactly the outcome they feared…. the partner becomes frustrated that they didn’t respond positively to their compliments. It’s a vicious circle.

Winch goes on to say that even people with better self esteem may have trouble receiving compliments. They may have grown up in a family that didn’t offer praise, or grown up with people who didn’t know how to accept compliments.

People typically don’t want to seem egotistical…. they want to remain humble. And according to the authors of the book: Surprise: Embrace the Unpredictable and Engineer the Unexpected, feeling awkward about compliments is a form of self-protection which can prevent us from accepting kind words and gratitude from others.

So the bottom line is, we can all be susceptible to struggling with receiving compliments. Does any of this sound familiar?

Ok, so now we know that a whopping 85% of us may suffer from low self-esteem. Bummer. And that can make it really hard to accept compliments.

But the good news is, we can do something about it. And there are some compelling reasons why we should.

If someone handed you a gift 🎁, would you look at them and say, “I don’t want it.”? Of course not.

When someone is complimenting you, they are giving you a gift 🎁… the gift of kindness. If you reject that gift, you are rejecting their kindness and hurting them. Think of it like this… the compliment you are receiving is really about the giver, not about you. If you think of it this way, it will make it a lot easier to accept it.

When someone compliments you, they are just telling you how what you did impacted them. Even if you don’t think what you did was so great, they did. It’s ok to simply accept their point of view. So instead of rejecting the compliment, just say, “Thank you.” That’s it. Don’t over think it.

It can take some practice to just say, “Thank you”, especially if we’re conditioned to responding with some negative comment about ourselves. But you can create a positive habit with just two words… “Thank you”. Nothing more.

And when you get good at it, maybe, for a little flair, you might even add, “I appreciate you saying that.” (Now you’re living on the edge!)

Then let that good feeling of kindness sink in. Be grateful for the gift you have received and glad that something you did made a difference for someone else. Enough of a difference that they complimented you.

Your simple ‘thank you’ will reward the giver and you will have created a ripple of kindness.

Question: What do you say when someone compliments you? Have you ever struggled with receiving a compliment? Share your thoughts in the comments below or simply reply to this email.

May your week be filled with kindness. 💜

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PS: Something new!

Do you like movies? Then I invite you to visit MovieWise, an intriguing newsletter about the life lessons we can learn from movies! It has some terrific movie reviews.

“All of life’s riddles are answered in the movies.” ~ Steve Martin (in Grand Canyon, 1991)