Ok, so we’re not even close to Thanksgiving. But there is something that I have been trying to work on in the past few years, and I’ve been pretty lousy at it lately. Saying Thank You.
Now, I don’t mean when someone holds the door for me or picks up something that I have dropped, or goes out of their way to do something nice for me. I think I am pretty good and pretty appreciative of that. But it has come to my attention that I do not accept compliments easily.
Someone may comment on my hair, or my smile or my outfit. I do lots of baking and get comments on that. And something occurred (again) to me. You should never downplay a compliment.
Someone thought enough of you to give you a compliment. And whether or not you believe it to be true, they think that it is. I don’t believe we compliment each other enough. But maybe even more importantly, we don’t receive them.
Allow me to put a different perspective on this. If someone gave you a very nice gift, whether it was something you needed or not, would you say to them, “Oh I don’t really need that.” Or “Sorry, but I can’t accept that.” Most likely you would receive it with appreciation. Why would we consider a compliment any different?
I am most likely the most guilty of them all. I don’t think that anything I do is all that special. But… to someone else it might be. Someone else might not be able to bake to save their soul. My talent of baking may be something they admire. To me, it’s just an inherited gift. But I can’t sew to save my life. Someone who can, definitely gets my admiration. In my personal opinion, both sewing and baking are becoming a dying art, but that’s another story for another time.
My point is this: we really should not downplay a compliment. Usually my response is “you’re too kind.” Or ” that’s very kind of you.” It’s a baby step to a genuine thank you. But we all gotta start somewhere. The person who gives you the compliment will feel good about giving it to you, and you just might start to believe them.