Praise and Self Created Darkness

This week I was chastised for not giving credit.My answer is that I am no one. I have no right or authority to praise you.

Only you know what you are doing, why you are doing it and how much actual effort you are putting into your project.

If are you satisfied with your work why should you care what I think?

To me praise is corrupting. Writers steal the work of other writers to gain praise. Athletes take illegal drugs to unfairly improve their performance in an effort to gain praise. Businessmen falsify the financial results of their enterprises to gain praise.

People doing these things have lost their moral compass. They have no authentic selves and need strangers to give them self worth.

Is it true that our greatest artists are frequently ridiculed while they live and are celebrated as geniuses for centuries after their death? Could other artists perhaps possessing equal talent been corrupted by public approval and somehow become unable to express the genius within them?

I could achieve nothing at all if I expected or needed praise. I try to eat good food and keep my weight under control. I exercise for at least two hours a day for more than half of each week. Could I do this if I was seeking praise?

In fact there is nothing I do that gets praise, or merits praise. I do what I do to achieve the best that I can achieve. I know I can never satisfy the high standards of anyone else.

I am a terrible athlete compared to Zajim. Any athletic satisfaction that I can achieve must come from me meeting a standard high for me, however low it is for someone far more talented.

You alone know if your values and achievements are your authentic contribution to your own good life, or something shiny, fake and designed to please a dim, unknowing, uncaring, sometimes vulgar and possibly cruel audience.

If you spend a lot of time worrying about what others are doing or blaming others for your disappointments and shortcomings you maybe be wasting valuable energy on issues that have almost no bearing on your own true level of happiness.

The real rebels, unknown and upraised among us are unselfish and compassionate. To me our civilization is rich in opportunity and entirely wonderful, but the world we have made is also full of violence, ignorance and cruelty. Who, but the unknown, odd and never praised will shine a light on the self created darkness that many are cursed with?