Praise

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There is one thing for which all humans crave
It is not money, it is not sleep, it is praise

And yet we do it so rarely
We receive it so rarely

And if finally we receive some praise
we tend to be lousy at receiving it.

When we are babies it seems so natural
We receive praise for almost everything,
from a cute smile to holding a cookie in our hand.
We are keen on praising babies,
because the baby will not think: what does this one want from me!
because it feels like the right thing to do
because the act of praising a baby feels so good.

When we like something about an adult,
praise is no longer a natural thing to give.
"what will he or she think?"
And we forego willingly the joy of giving praise;
we deprive the fellow adult of receiving praise.

We do not need flattery.
Sincere heartfelt praise we do need.
But to be able to give it,
we have to learn how to receive it first.
Let us praise sincerely ourselves first.
If someone gives us a compliment,
we do not need to break down the reason for the compliment;
we can just gracefully accept it
admit that we like it too, or a sincere thanks for the compliment;
If we get a compliment for a skill, we can explain a bit on how we acquired it.
We need praise, and gracefully accepting praise
will boost our own capacity to give praise to others.
We can praise ourselves during our night time reflection
All these things will help us to give sincere praise to others.

Let us try today and in the coming week
to give at least one sincere praise to another adult per day.
A different adult every day...
By the end of the week, it is likely that we have made a positive difference 
for 7 people; extremely likely at least 6 and almost certainly at least 5