Why do I act this way?

Post Reply New Topic

I do theater and I always seem to have a hard time taking constructive criticism from my mother. She tries to help me and I do want her help especially when it comes to how to saying my lines but every time she tries to correct me I get an attitude. I kind of have developed an ego and sometimes it can get the better of me. And eventually my apologies won't mean anything anymore. My mom does not deserve to be treated badly just because she's trying to help me.

Why can't I just change? I'm tired of making these mistakes over and over again because the one thing that I fear most is my parents in general not forgiving me anymore. I want to cry all the time because I hate that I'm like this. Heck I'm crying right now. The callbacks for the show I'm auditioning for are on Tuesday and now I'm afraid to even ask my mom for help for the rest of tonight or even tomorrow. I feel so bad all the time. I just don't understand. If anyone here has done theater I hope you know where I'm coming from. For me it's easy to take direction from directors and teachers but not my own mother and I hate it.

Are you like this when you get the same kind of feedback from other people?

No I'm not. And that's what I don't like. I don't want to treat my mom with disdain but I do and no matter how hard I try I just can't get my brain to process that she's trying to help me. It's just harder when it's my mom and not a drama teacher and I can't figure out why I can't push myself to just accept her help without thinking it's a torture chamber.

It'll be something to do with the mother - child relationship then. We all tend to revert mentally to little children when around our parents or when being chastised by them. It's pretty normal, but sure what the solution to your specific problem is but as it's well documented it might be worth Google to see if there are any decent articles on handing feed back from a parent.

That's very good advice. Thank you very much.

I'm sure there are others who have felt the same way as I do.

If you only have this problem with your mom and not teachers or anyone else then maybe you could ask your mother not to advice you on this matter anymore and tell her to leave it to your teachers? Or do you absolutely need her advice for this? If so then I'd recommend trying counting to ten/doing some other routine every time before you react to your mother's criticism in any way; it might help you to calm down.

When my parents tried to teach me how to drive,
it absolutely didn't work.

1) I made my mom nervous.
2) Dad made me nervous.

They ended up hiring a private driving instructor for me.
That worked out well, and I got my license.