Imagine the following scene. You’re at the Friday after-work beer. You tell one of your co-workers about your side project. You’re excited.
Then your co-worker provides you feedback. Honest feedback. The feedback you need to get better. It’s not a confirmation or alignment. It’s a brutally honest critique to make you better. Not to make you feel cozy.
You’re destroyed. Someone isn’t in agreement with your passion.
You defend. You raise your voice. You shut down the person who provides the valuable feedback. End of conversation.
That’s the short-term. Shutting down opinions of others. Avoiding people who are not agreeing with you.
A better short-term is to listen to the feedback. Acknowledge it. Take it home. It just made you better.
The long-term however is to focus on the conversation. To build a relationship with your co-worker. To ask and listen to the excitements of your co-worker. To see the content of the conversation as a side-product while aiming for a long-term relationship.
The long-term will bring more candid feedback, honesty, and shared excitement. You wanted this to happen today. But today is not the long-term.