How to Think When Your Family Criticizes Your Career

How to Think When Your Family Criticizes Your Career

What You'll Learn in This Article

• Why it hurts so much when family criticizes your work
• How to separate your family's values from your own way of working
• How to handle it when your career choices are dismissed
• Words to revisit when you need them

When Family Criticizes Your Work, It Can Feel Like They're Rejecting Your Entire Life

Having your family dismiss your work can be incredibly painful.

"Are you sure that job is going to work out?" "You should get a more stable job." "That's not a normal way to work." "You'd be better off at a proper company." "What's going to happen to your future if you keep doing that?"

When you hear things like this, it can feel like they're not just questioning your career choice—they're rejecting the way you've chosen to live your life.

Work is deeply tied to your lifestyle, your values, and how you live. That's why when family criticizes your work, it's easy to feel like they don't believe in your life.

You wanted their support. At the very least, you wanted them to listen. When they shut you down from the start, it's only natural that it hurts.

Your Family's Views on Work Are Shaped by Their Era and Experiences

When family criticizes your work, there's usually a set of beliefs about work behind it.

A stable company is best. Being a full-time employee is best. You should stay at one place for a long time. Higher income is better. A job that's easy to explain to others is better.

These values often come from the era your family grew up in and the experiences they've had.

For them, they may genuinely just be worried about you. But their concerns don't necessarily align with your values or the realities of today.

Now, there are many ways to work and live. Career changes, side jobs, freelancing, remote work, part-time work, indie development, investing, multiple income streams. The options are different from what they used to be.

Your family's view of work is not the only right answer.

Separate Concern from Criticism

When your family criticizes your work, it helps to distinguish between genuine concern and outright dismissal.

There can be useful things in what your family is worried about:

• Will your income be stable?
• Can you cover your living expenses?
• Will you burn out or hurt your health?
• Are you keeping your future options open?
• Are you prepared for risks?

These are perspectives worth considering.

On the other hand:

• That kind of work is embarrassing
• It's not normal
• It's not respectable
• You can't handle it
• I won't accept that way of living

These kinds of statements can cross the line into imposing values or attacking your character.

It's okay to separate what's worth taking on board from what you don't need to accept.

Be Able to Explain Your Work to Yourself

When family criticizes your work, having things sorted out in your own mind makes you a little less likely to waver.

• Why did you choose this work?
• What matters most to you?
• How are you thinking about income and living expenses?
• How are you preparing for risks?
• How do you plan to adapt going forward?

When you can answer these for yourself, even if your family criticizes you, it's easier to remind yourself: "It's not like I haven't thought this through."

You don't need to fully convince your family. But it matters that you yourself feel confident in your choices.

Words to Revisit

When your family criticizes your work, try coming back to words like these:

• Your family's view of work is not the only right answer
• It's okay to separate what you can take as concern from criticism you don't need to accept
• You're allowed to think about your own way of working for yourself
• Even if your family doesn't understand, your worth doesn't disappear
• Your career choices are yours to make as part of your own life

In Summary: Even If Your Family Criticizes Your Work, You're Allowed to Think About Your Own Life

When family criticizes your work, it can feel like they're rejecting your entire life. But your family's view of work isn't necessarily the only right answer.

Take on board what you can use as genuine concern, and be careful not to internalize value judgments or personal attacks too deeply.

With My Affirmation, you can save words to revisit after your family criticizes your work—words that help you believe in how you work, words that remind you it's okay to think about your own life on your own terms. On the days when your family's words shake your confidence in your career, having words that support you can make it just a little easier to find your footing again.

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