I’m involved in several email lists and I notice that list users behave is if they have the right, no the obligation, to offer unsolicited advice, feedback and criticism. Someone posts an email stating their feelings of separation and loneliness and shortly there are replies suggesting all the ways that the poster’s thinking is the problem, his attitude needs adjusting, his negativity is at fault.

In my counseling practice I often meet couples who feel no compunction about criticizing each other at will. People often behave as if there is an unwritten rule that permits partners to criticize at will. “I’m only telling the truth.” “Isn’t honesty the best policy?” “Can’t you see I’m trying to be helpful?”

As a psychiatrist friend of mine once said (earthily) “A fart is a completely honest expression but I don’t want one in my face!”

Criticism is corrosive. Criticism corrodes trust. It corrodes intimacy. It can create the opposite of intimacy.

When I offer unsolicited suggestions I imply that I know more or better than you, that you are less than me. I’m not convinced that any person is less than any other person. And I’m constantly amazed at the different ways we are, each of us, very wise. While differently abled, we are remarkably equal, especially in the realms of love, intimacy and sexuality.

Often we criticize from apparently loving motives. We think we are “helping” our partner/lover/mate. Keeping our partner from “making a mistake,” or appearing “foolish,” or “improving” him/her.

I like to think that life is very much like playing jazz - there is no such thing as a mistake, only consequences - both intended and unintended. And I notice there is value in both kinds of consequences. Stopping my partner from making mistakes seems to me to be akin to trying to stop my partner from growing and learning - a bad plan.

Trying to keep my partner from appearing “foolish” and hoping to “improve” my partner, while laudable goals in concept, are impossible in practice. Either my partner is, in fact, a fool. In which case there is little I can do to change that. Or my partner is not a fool, in which case I’m doing a disservice to my partner, undervaluing my partner, and, in a not so subtle way, demeaning my partner.

The next time you’re tempted to criticize a loved one I suggest you notice if it’s your own internal critic busting your own chops that is motivating you to “fix” your lover/friend/partner. If yes, time to do some mirror work. If not, time to look at a quick cost-benefit analysis. What is the cost of criticism - loss of intimacy, loss of trust? What’s the benefit- hmmm, what is the benefit?