Pauline Meglino, Aesthetic Realism consultant, writes:
Praise: it’s music to most every wife’s ears. She has expected it, looked for it, angled for it, cherished it, and equated it with her husband’s love. Yet, though the desired praise may be gotten and seem so pleasing, why can a woman still feel deeply unsure of herself and sense something is missing?
The explanation women have longed for will be presented at the Understanding Marriage! class on Saturday morning, October 10th, from 11:00 AM to 12:30 PM: “How Can a Wife Be Sensible about Praise?”
Conducted by Barbara Allen, Anne Fielding, and myself, Pauline Meglino, of the teaching trio There Are Wives, this event is open to all women. There’s going to be enlivening, in-depth discussion of these definitive statements from an essay on praise by Eli Siegel, the founder of Aesthetic Realism:
There are many women who have been praised by men they knew and have felt, nevertheless, that something not so good was being encouraged in them or evoked from them. The Aesthetic Realism viewpoint is that if anything is flattering to yourself and doesn’t make the whole world look better in your eyes, that which is flattery is only flattery—it’s not useful praise. We all of us want praise of ourselves; and the need to look into the nature of the praise can be not so welcome. But once we are not critical of why we’re praised, there can be a letdown that is too great. The most important thing about praise of yourself is that you should be able to believe it and be proud that you believe it.
Each woman will be learning what it means for praise to be useful: when it has a woman feel honestly comprehended and strengthens what Aesthetic Realism explains is the best thing in her: the desire to like the world. Women simply haven’t known this! And all that she learns at this practical, cultural event will enable a woman to feel what she had thought impossible, that, yes!–she can be honestly sensible about praise!