What's Hiding Behind the Projection?

Freud called it projection. It’s a coping mechanism that helps us “deal” with impulses or qualities in ourselves that we deny—and then project onto others.

The problem is not that the fault, shortcoming, weakness, sin, characteristic, trait doesn’t correlate to something factually true in others (though that can always be debated); the problem is that by projecting fault on others, we’ve at once avoided addressing the problem in our self and satisfied the innate desire we have for genuine growth.

Attending to other’s shortcomings (and growth) has become a weak substitute for our own.

So we pick apart their habits and lifestyle choices.
Criticize their project, their website, their design.
Nit pick their language and appearance and audience.
And it feels like progress. Like we’ve done something productive.

But all we’ve done is avoid the work ourselves.

The next time you think someone else’s gift to the world is not up to snuff, pause, and ask yourself: What am I hiding about my own work?