Processing Feedback: Discard

Episode Transcript

The Processing Feedback Discard card states, “You have permission to reject feedback. If you have analyzed it and found it inaccurate or unhelpful, adopting it can sabotage your growth.” And the card invites you to practice the clearing, which you can do by consciously deciding, “I have understood this, considered it, and chosen not to adopt it.” Then imagine closing the mental file.

Let’s get into this one. So this card ties back to insights from the receiving suit, where we practiced not immediately agreeing or disagreeing in the moment feedback arrives. This card extends that into the phase after receiving, because often, even once the conversation’s over, the pressures to agree or reject don’t disappear. They follow us. Pressure from hierarchy, from wanting to seem coachable, from mood, energy, timing.

On that note, you may have heard of the hungry judge effect. A widely cited study found that judges granted parole more often right after meal breaks than right before them, suggesting that something as simple as hunger was shaping decisions of enormous consequence. Now, in the spirit of realism, I should tell you it’s not as simple as the headline version. Some researchers have pushed back on parts of that study. Portions of it have been maybe debunked or complicated. But I think the broader phenomenon it points to is obvious and well-supported. Our decisions are impacted by a whole range of factors, including perhaps beyond the ones that seem most relevant: fatigue, hunger, stress, the meeting we just left. None of us are exempt, and that includes how we judge feedback.

This is exactly why a deliberate processing phase exists. It’s the counterweight. Rather than letting the verdict on a piece of feedback get decided by whatever state we happen to be in when it arrived, we slow down, analyze the source, sort it, check it against patterns, calibrate with people we trust, hold it while we are experiencing a range of states rather than just one. And when the genuine analysis concludes the feedback is inaccurate or unhelpful, you have permission to reject it. Full permission. Of course, depending on the nature of the work and your relationship with the person who gave it to you. Adopting feedback you’ve honestly found to be wrong doesn’t make you coachable, and it can genuinely sabotage your growth.

After making a decision, we often keep holding the what-ifs. What if they were right? What if I should have listened? Now, a little of this can be healthy. Humility means staying revisable. But past a certain point, the open loop just drains you. The file sits on the desk getting picked up and put down, picked up and put down. That’s why this card ends with a visualization. Imagine actually closing the mental file. Decision made, reasoning recorded, file closed. The closure can free your attention for the focused state of development that the pursuit of mastery always, always, always requires.

That’s card 08 of the Processing Feedback suit. If there’s feedback you’ve already analyzed and quietly rejected but keep reopening, try making the decision conscious and complete. Close the file. This can help you transform all that what-if energy into the energy you need to grow in new ways.