I can’t take a compliment...

[Sorryusernamealreadyexists]

So my manager gave me a lovely compliment the other day, I’m doing some important training on some of our computer programs and I’m really enjoying it! I, of course, responded by playing it off and putting myself down in response.

She said that she’s noted I find it really hard to accept any compliment, which I didn’t realise I even did! She said she can tell it makes me uncomfortable to receive it

So thinking about it, even when my OH compliments me on my outfit or work (he does a lot) I will always deflect it.

Does anyone else struggle with this? For me I think it’s definitely a self confidence thing - ie I think I’m shit so why don’t other people.

How do you learn to take a compliment? 🤷🏼‍♀️

I used to do this all the time too, and had similar feedback. I had to re-train my responses, so now (even though I still might not believe them), if someone pays me a compliment, I always just say “thank you” and mentally file it away to stress over later in private!

Sometime giving a compliment I batted away once nicely explained that it is a great pleasure to give a well received compliment and it makes you feel lovely on both sides, so by extinguishing the given praise is like turning down a gift.
I had never seen it that way before and was only coming at it from a low self esteem pov and it was a complete reflex.
That conversation made me pause in my tracks and I consciously practised just giving a smile and a thank you and resisting all the urges to argue, deflect, dismiss the compliment. It felt utterly alien at first but gradually felt like a better fit and now, years later, I'm a dab hand at it.
The surprising side effect was that as I became better at taking a compliment I started to want to give more so I dish those out much more too, and I think the world is a better place for it. 😊

So many women do this. I was terrible for this, then I forced myself to just smile and say a genuine “thank you!” rather than (“this old thing? It’s just from a charity shop” or similar). Felt a bit of a knob the first couple of times but it genuinely has helped my self esteem. Makes the person giving the compliment feel less awkward too!

Thank you that's a lovely compliment.

My standard response

I do it all the time. Low self esteem, I guess but compliments make me uncomfortable.

Next time you get a compliment, force yourself to just say thank you and then shut up, day nothing else about it. It gives space for your cognitive dissonance to calm right down. Once that has passed you can then digest what was said in your own time.
Eventually it gets easier.

I used to do this too, I suppose it was low self confidence. I'm much better now, which I put down to being older and more comfortable in myself.

Im a person who likes to give compliments - both to people I know and occasionally to women I see out and about who I think look fantastic. I don’t bull-shit ever... I only say it if I mean it. I like to think it makes someone’s day a little nicer... please don’t make it awkward by being weird about it. Don’t immediately go into “ oh you can’t mean me because I’m nothing” because then I have to offer reassurance and it becomes a “thing”. Just say thank you - you could even say “ I’m not very good at accepting compliments but thank you” But please accept it in the spirit in which it’s intended 😃

Thank you so much, there’s some excellent tips here that I’ll definitely take on board

Agreed with everyone else OP, practice, practice, practice. As you get better at accepting them you’ll get better at believing them too, and even occasionally paying yourself a compliment. It’s actually really good for your self-esteem!

I find taking a compliment almost impossible, it’s totally down to low confidence. It’s something I’m working on though and the tips here are great.

Just to echo what everyone else said. I was similar to you, but I found it annoying in others when I said something nice and they batted it back.

Realising that I 'trained' myself to think that declining a compliment was rude; if someone said they though something about me, insisting that they were wrong was just telling them I knew better, and really who was I to know what people actually think? Just say thank you.

Accepting compliments properly probably comes with age and experience - something which I've got at last in my mid-sixties and it will come to you in time. In the meantime practice - just smile and say thank you. You got a compliment because you deserved it. Then bask in a warm glow.

I was like this at one point up until maybe my late 20s. I then read an article about it and the suggestion was to smile and say thank you. Nothing more, don’t deflect, don’t press further or engage in any conversation about it, just smile and say thank you. At first I was forcing myself to do that but it soon became second nature and happens by itself now.

I just say thank you, even if I don't agree/believe it.
Overall, it's a lot less fuss than deflecting it.

I'm terrible at accepting comments. On my wedding day I was amazed at how blown away guests were by my dress (it wasn't a traditional wedding dress so I wasn't expecting it) and so many people telling me how beautiful I looked etc
My response? 'Oooo thanks, do you know it was only £60?'

On the flip side, I once gave a friend a compliment along the lines of “oh wow you look really great” and she totally deflected it saying “what, are you saying I look like shit most of the time?”. It pissed me off to such a degree that I vowed never to compliment her again.

That day I learned that can come across very rude not to accept a compliment that is well intended.

If someone compliments me, no matter what I think, I always say “that’s really kind of you to say so”

I have trained myself to give a big smile and a warm thank you - which makes the complimenter feel good about themselves. If someone is kind enought to say something nice to me, I want to return the warm glow.

Hi @Sorryusernamealreadyexists - I used to be like you, I could deflect compliments like the best Wimbledon backhander. Over the past three years I've had quite a bit of therapy (divorce) and realised that my XH was responsible for making me feel so worthless, so invalid, so ugly, so unattractive to be with, even when I made an effort he would put me down ("those shoes look so uncomfortable - why would you wear them?" / "that dress just doesn't suit you, put something else on").

All the confidence I had when we met, he fed on like the proverbial parasite.

Through therapy I've realised that actually, I have value, I actually really love myself, I'm proud of who I am, how strong I am, and I've regained my confidence. My opinions are worth discussing, and I scrub up quite well these days! Finally I can accept compliments and it's a huge step!

I'm not saying it's the same for you - but perhaps look no further than how you feel about yourself, before you learn to accept compliments from others, and how they see your revitalised new belief in beautiful you?

Hi OP I'd actually like to complement you on starting a genuinely useful and interesting thread here in MN. One that sounds like it has reaped rewards not just for you but also other PPs with a similar issue. Nice one