Byron Katie once said something like “the mind’s job is to find problems“. I don’t have many skills, but fault-finding is one of my most finely honed talents. Because of my engineering training and genetic design, I can find fault with any person, place, thing, or situation. I put myself right up there on Everest with Don Rickles.
The trouble with constant fault finding is that one spends a huge portion of one’s precious time criticizing instead of creating. It’s a real tragedy because we were all put on this earth to create. The ability to create is naturally built in to each of us right out of the box.
Creation is an intimate act of communication between the creator and the created.
Obsessive fault finders are afraid of creating and exposing their own creations for fear of being criticized themselves. No one likes to be told that their baby is ugly but, au contraire, many people love to point out flaws in other people’s fugly children.
One way to break the fault finder mind set is to take the plunge. Stop oppressing yourself, do what’s natural, start creating stuff (a blog, a song, a painting, a computer program, a book, a company, a community, a tribe), and hoist it out there for all to see. The more you create and expose of yourself, the more you dismantle the fault finder mindset and the more liberated you become. Try it, especially if you’re an incorrigible fault finder like me.
