1. I’m British. Self-deprecation is a national past-time.
2. I don’t know how. I’ve never been nominated for an Oscar so have never had any reason to spend hours in front of the mirror practicing my gracious acceptance speech.
3. I’m suspicious. I suspect you have a motive for something. My work colleague bought me two oranges this morning. He had an agenda. I think of your compliments as those oranges and am trying to work out the agenda.
4. You are complimenting me on the wrong things. Do I need a compliment on how nice this dress looks or how good my language skills are? Why do you never compliment me on the things that matter? Like when I made you a cup of tea without any cat hair floating on the top, the fact my hair doesn’t look horrendous although I couldn’t be bothered to shower that morning or that I stacked my collection of different sized post-it notes into a pleasingly aesthetic pyramid.
5. I’m not sure it is a compliment. ‘You’ve lost so much weight, well done!’ Is that a compliment? Is it just highlighting that I needed/still need to lose so much weight?
6. I’m cynical. I don’t believe you. I too have tacked on a ‘that looks really nice’ to a comment that was meant to stop at ‘oh, you have had your hair cut’ but was then followed by an awkward pause that needed to be filled.
7. I don’t want to reciprocate. Accepting the compliment may make me feel obliged to compliment you in return and lying is a sin. I’m not going to hell because of social conventions. Other reasons, sure. But not social conventions.
8. I have low self-esteem. You are probably mocking me. I’m going to find a nice corner to cry in now.
9. I have a god-complex. Your compliments are meaningless to me. Does the boot care if the ant thinks complimentary thoughts about it as it stomps the ant out of existence? No. Go waste your worthless compliments on someone who thinks you matter.
10. I don’t want to scare you off. Your compliment was lovely actually but if I say thanks in a way that truly expresses the overwhelming inner joy I feel with Cheshire cat grin and shiny eyes open-wide to frightening proportions and glistening with the tears of joy about to fall, you will not only never compliment me again but will probably move to a different country just to get away. Much safer to grumble a non-acknowledgement and move on.
Fear of the reaper 
This made me laugh out loud! I too don’t accept compliments and go all shuffly in the feet region when people say nice things. It’s just so non-British!
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I can so relate! I grew up in a very British household. The greatest compliment my Scottish father every meted out was, “You’ll do!” My ex-husband told me that I was always looking for affirmation and/or recognition. Perhaps that is so (the Husband doesn’t seem to think so), but what it did mean was that I grew up not being able to accept compliments. I’ve been told off about that, by numerous people over the years and it’s taken a while, but I’ve learned that, sometimes, it is good simply to accept them at face value without looking for an agenda. If there is an agenda and you don’t see it, it’s their loss or error, not yours. Accepting them on the outside doesn’t mean we feel any less a bit weird and/or huffy about it… It’s taken me a very long time to get to this space, a very long time. I wish it had happened sooner; it’s been quite liberating. Give it a go 😉
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Thanks for sharing your experiences, I thought it probably wasn’t just me! I wasn’t really aware that I was incapable of accepting a compliment until a year or so ago when this was first pointed out to me but I’ve been quite conscious of it since then. I am trying to just accept them, although it definitely takes practice and doesn’t come naturally. But as you said this is something that can be learned so I hope I’ll get the hang of it eventually 🙂
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Good luck! And keep practicing… 🙂
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Ha Ha! I can really relate to this as I can’t accept a compliment either! I normally turn it around and put myself down (We Brits as you say are great at that). I then get upset if people agree with the put-down!
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You have to fell sorry for the poor compliment givers, they probably just wanted to say something nice but on getting shot down and watching their compliment get twisted around probably think it’s easier to just agree with the negative spin.
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Yes, that’s true. We are just going to have to learn how to accept them.
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Every day, I try to pick someone from the comments on the blogs I read, and I picked you today. Just wanted to say that I was not disappointed.
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Thanks very much, that’s a lovely thing to hear. I also really like your tactic of actively picking a new person to look at every day, I’ll give that a go.
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