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<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.thegoodtrade.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/IMG_0206-scaled.jpeg\")
<\/figure>\n\n“These defensive behaviors are instincts designed to keep them safe from whatever perceived danger triggered their fear.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
In both cases, we learned about this the hard way: William nipped my husband on the forehead during a snuggle when Aaron got too close to his face. Penny tried to bite my boot off when I held out a leg to keep her from getting hit by the front door. In both cases, the dogs were lying down \u2014 a position that takes them, on a good day, half a minute to ease out of into standing (picture a fat seal trying to take off in a sprint and you get the idea). We never learned William\u2019s backstory, but we knew that Penny\u2019s back leg had been crushed in a door by young children years back, an accident that was bad enough to warrant surgery. It is no wonder that she’s particularly skittish around doors, especially when she\u2019s lying down. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
When dogs are threatened, they display clear defensive behaviors: vocalizations (barking, growling, whining); body language signals (freezing, hackles raising, baring teeth); even full flight or avoidance. These defensive behaviors are instincts designed to keep them safe from whatever perceived danger triggered their fear. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As it turns out, humans are not so different.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nWhy we get defensive (and the many forms it takes)<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Like animals, our brains are wired for survival. As we go about our lives, our brains are coding our experiences and triggering a hormonal response that might, for example, reward us with a sense of accomplishment or trigger us into self-preservation. Every time it repeats, the grooves of these neural pathways deepen, all in the hopes of keeping us safe and prolonging our survival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When our brains code an event as a threat, it happens like this: The amygdala signals our hypothalamus<\/a> to flood our systems with adrenaline and cortisol, preparing the body to confront or flee from danger \u2014 aka, fight-or-flight. This is called the stress response, and it\u2019s an automatic survival mechanism that can happen well before conscious thought. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Defensiveness is also automatic, but unlike the stress response \u2014 a physiological phenomenon \u2014 defensiveness is a psychological and behavioral response.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
It is also a somewhat faulty and obsolete system for our contemporary lives, where the perceived \u201cdangers\u201d are often not dangerous in the least. Like when we get a flurry of emails all at once and our bodies respond as though we were just confronted by a grizzly bear. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Defensiveness is also automatic, but unlike the stress response \u2014 a physiological phenomenon \u2014 defensiveness is a psychological and behavioral response. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In other words, defensiveness is a learned reaction to the stress response, for instances when we feel threatened or unsafe. Not grizzly-bear-confrontation-type threats, remember, but something more along the lines of criticism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Defensive behavior in humans doesn\u2019t look all too different from how we see it in dogs: vocalizations like denial, arguing, accusing, and making excuses; body language that looks aggressive and charged, possibly even escalating to violence; fleeing the situation by refusing to verbally engage or even with physical avoidance. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Like most behaviors that are driven by fear, the intent (to protect the self) and the impact (psychological or emotional harm) don\u2019t always add up here.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So often, we receive criticism \u2014 whether at home, in our social circles, or at work \u2014 as an attack. Maybe we feel misunderstood, or like our actions were unfairly interpreted. Maybe feeling like we disappointed someone or didn\u2019t meet their expectations triggers a bone-deep fear about our self-worth. Or maybe we simply weren\u2019t prepared to hear something hard, and our defensiveness is a reaction to being uncomfortable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Defensiveness in the face of criticism and feedback about our behaviors, performance, or actions might feel like a natural response, but it almost always does more harm than good \u2014\u00a0both to our relationships and also to ourselves. After all, we are responsible for our behaviors, words, and actions. It is appropriate to be held accountable to them, and we should want to improve in these areas, right?\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Defensiveness in the face of criticism and feedback about our behaviors, performance, or actions might feel like a natural response, but it almost always does more harm than good.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
Here\u2019s the truth: We will all do and say things in every area of our lives that will require redirection. It is unreasonable to expect that we \u2014\u00a0or anyone else \u2014 will always do the exact right thing at the exact right time in the exact right way. If indeed we want to do, say, and be \u201cperfect\u201d in every scenario, the irony is that we have to expect that we won\u2019t be, while continuing to try anyway.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And then we have to actively invite the feedback we need to help us improve. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nLearn to be self-aware, not self-conscious<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Self-awareness and self-consciousness might sound similar, but they are crucially distinct. Understanding the difference between them is the first step in developing a healthy relationship with our personal growth and curbing the defensive mechanisms that can keep us stuck.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Self-awareness is the ability to observe and identify your emotions, characteristics (like perceived strengths and weaknesses), and motivations \u2014 without judgment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Self-consciousness is observing and identifying your emotions, characteristics, and motivations with a critical eye, through the lens of external perception. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
When we assess ourselves, we can take the role of a curious observer, or we can be the mean girl from every high school movie in the early aughts (raise your hand if you\u2019ve felt personally victimized by the Regina George living in your head). Curiosity invites questions and helps us to think more deeply beyond our first or even second reactions to situations. Judgment stokes doubt, fear, and a preoccupation with negative outcomes.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Self-awareness is a practice that brings clarity and helps us to truly know ourselves; self-consciousness brings anxiety, making us stuck in a loop of worrying about ourselves. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Self-awareness is a practice that brings clarity and helps us to truly know ourselves; self-consciousness brings anxiety, making us stuck in a loop of worrying about ourselves.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
Sometimes, we can redirect our self-talk in the moment, taking a self-conscious thought like \u201cI can\u2019t wear this dress to work, everyone will think I\u2019m looking for attention,\u201d and turning it into a moment for introspection: \u201cThe idea of wearing this dress to work is making me feel nervous, I wonder why?\u201d Other times, we might need to take the time to engage more deeply. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mental practices like mindfulness and meditation can help build up the skills that will slow down the knee-jerk defensive responses and habits that we might need to rewire. Redirecting our attention to the present moment, identifying the observable facts of a situation, and focusing on our breathing can help us learn to be with our thoughts and feelings without having to act on them right away. Dialing back the urgency will make it all the easier to let ourselves be for long enough to observe what\u2019s happening, and to identify what we\u2019re seeing with calm, unbiased curiosity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Keeping a journal, talking to a therapist, or developing an interpretation practice like Tarot can help hone the ability to dive even deeper into understanding the roots of our emotions. Understanding our triggers, patterns, and tendencies with an open mind and compassion can help us build better habits for preparation, support, and reflection.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nMake friends with failure <\/h4>\n\n\n\n
One of the greatest disservices we have done to ourselves as a culture is stigmatizing failure. Any perceived failure in our lives can feel like a badge of shame, something heavy and cumbersome we\u2019re trying to keep hidden. If someone happens to see it, we do whatever we can to protect ourselves, grasping the first defense mechanism we can reach. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Would we still behave this way if failure weren’t considered so bad?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s all too easy to think of success as a zero-sum game, as if success happens instead<\/em> of failure,\u00a0rather than as a result<\/em> of many failed attempts. But as any artist or scientist or athlete can attest, every major masterpiece, breakthrough, or triumph is built on a pile of failed efforts they made to get there.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Failure is not intrinsically negative, but we have coded it that way. Sure, failing on some levels is harder to handle than others, but even the worst-case scenarios can take on a more generative meaning with the right framework. Getting fired, for example, feels terrible \u2014\u00a0but so does staying at a job that\u2019s a bad fit.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Failure is not intrinsically negative, but we have coded it that way.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
If we can reframe our relationship to failure from the ground up, how might this help us grow? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Imagine if we included an expectation for failure, and how our relationship with failing might shift? What would it mean to fail if the associated shame and embarrassment never came?\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The writer Sonia Feldman reframed her relationship with failure by flipping the goal of getting published in a literary magazine on its head: Instead of focusing on trying to get an acceptance, she focused on getting 100 rejections<\/a>. By doing this, she reduced the emotional toll of the inevitable rejection that\u2019s part of the process of submitting work for publication, and prevented the demoralization that could stop her from continuing to try. In other words, she incorporated the certainty of failure into her process. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Her debut novel, by the way, comes out this summer<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nOwn your \u201cweaknesses\u201d and work on them, publicly<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
I struggle with a desire to appear competent to others. I want to be taken seriously, and I want to be given credit for my skills and talents in a way that has been described as \u201cshowoffy\u201d or \u201cattention-seeking\u201d at various times in my life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I could deny these tendencies, or try to rationalize them \u2014 in fact, I tried that approach for most of my adult life. But that defensiveness, which in theory was supposed to protect me from harm, had the effect of making me distinctly vulnerable to it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Seeking the praise and admiration I craved, I\u2019d become a bulldozer in projects, ignoring everyone else so I could secure the center of attention. If this backfired, I\u2019d become sulky and taciturn, drawing the sort of attention that only compounded my embarrassment and shame. If I couldn\u2019t look at myself honestly, it was absolutely unbearable when other people did. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“If I couldn\u2019t look at myself honestly, it was absolutely unbearable when other people did.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
When I tried owning these characteristics and stopped treating them like fatal flaws and more like the silly little quirks that they are, everything changed.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was easier to shift course when these behaviors showed up. I could call myself out and redirect, and it became easier for others to do so as well. I noticed that by facing these \u201cweaknesses\u201d head-on and owning them out loud, I didn\u2019t make myself more vulnerable at all, but less \u2014 in fact, I became impervious to the usual maelstrom of feelings that would accompany any associated feedback completely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cStephanie, I think you\u2019re dominating the project a bit in these areas \u2014\u00a0why don\u2019t we give someone else some airtime?\u201d was the kind of comment I could have lost months ruminating about. Now, all I had to do was make a little more room in the spotlight for someone else, no drama required.\u00a0Because it wasn’t a surprise to hear that I was taking over the project,\u00a0nor that other people had noticed. I knew this about myself, and I had owned it to others. All I had to do was go “Whoops!” and then shift back into my own lane. Then we could all move on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Working on this transparently also had the consequence of building trust in my teams, making it more likely for them to offer positive feedback and affirmation to me organically. I was getting everything I wanted so badly without wasting a moment despairing about it \u2014 and all I had to do was be brave enough to face the possibility of being a little uncomfortable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nGet a house gnome<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
TikTok is a real grab bag of content, and I\u2019m in no way advocating that we mine social media for our life advice. Every once in a while, however, the algorithm delivers something worth trying out. Of the thousands of videos I\u2019ve seen on the app, there is one that has actually reshaped the way my husband and I manage the inevitable friction that builds up between anyone sharing a home together: Allow me to introduce you to The house gnome<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The house gnome is an invisible, mischievous creature who’s always up to minor hijinks and creating little inconveniences at our home. The house gnome might leave the milk out on the counter all day, for example, or set a pair of muddy boots in the middle of the entryway. I would never do that, and neither would my husband, so it must have been the gnome. He also turns the back porch light back on after I distinctly remember turning it off, and sometimes he takes my husband\u2019s empty seltzer cans and leaves them on my clean dresser. He\u2019s always trying to get us in trouble with each other, but we\u2019re on to him!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“The house gnome is an invisible, mischievous creature who’s always up to minor hijinks and creating little inconveniences at our home.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
The house gnome has saved us an untold amount of unnecessary grief over things that are ultimately just not that important. But when you\u2019re stressed and tired, sometimes the most innocuous \u201cfriendly reminder\u201d can send you straight to the armory, ready to launch every defensive tactic you’ve got. \u201cHey honey, I thought you said you\u2019d turn out the porch light?\u201d might as well be an invitation to a duel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the house gnome takes the brunt of it instead. Because we know we\u2019re all trying our best here, and it\u2019s hard to be perfect all the time, and even harder to laugh it off when you\u2019re depleted and exhausted already. Especially when you have a house gnome coming along and causing trouble. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In other words: Find whatever silly ways you can to take yourself less seriously. It\u2019s much easier to remember what\u2019s more important than defensiveness. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nWhy we should invite and embrace feedback<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
As an artist and writer, I am no stranger to criticism. Critiques where peers and mentors offer (mostly) constructive feedback on work we have carefully and obsessively poured ourselves into might be familiar to me, but it\u2019s an experience that never really gets any easier. It\u2019s hard to hear what others think about you \u2014 even when you have explicitly invited them to tell you. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Just because I\u2019m uncomfortable, doesn\u2019t mean I don\u2019t need to know what they\u2019re telling me.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
But here\u2019s what I\u2019ve learned in more than 20 years of subjecting myself to formal circles of critiques: Just because it\u2019s hard to hear in the moment doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019s not useful, important, or relevant. Just because I\u2019m uncomfortable doesn\u2019t mean I don\u2019t need to know what they\u2019re telling me.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Practice makes perfect. Years of building trust and trying again and again made it possible for William to feel safe and secure enough to let me snuggle him right in his face. And the long road was worth it!<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n The other thing I\u2019ve learned? I can take it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I might feel those urges rise up \u2014 a desire to defend myself, or to explain what I really meant, or argue the point until I can change their mind \u2014 but giving in to those urges not only prevents me from learning something that might help me grow, they also usually become unbearable sources of embarrassment in the aftermath.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I can be held accountable for my actions, behaviors, art, and words. I can handle being uncomfortable. I can survive listening to something that\u2019s hard to hear. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We all can. Because we are more than any one thing we said or did. We\u2019re still learning, still growing, still getting to be better bit by bit, with experience, time, and new information. Even my first basset-mix William, who lived with us for six years, learned to relax if I put my face in his ruff while he was lying down. By the end, I was even able to kiss his regal, wrinkly brow without him even batting an eye. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We’re still working on Penny and her concern about the door, but we have time. We’ll just keep showing up and talking it through until one day she might see that she is okay, and there’s no danger here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nStephanie H. Fallon<\/strong> is a Contributing Editor at The Good Trade. She is a writer originally from Houston, Texas and holds an MFA from the Jackson Center of Creative Writing at Hollins University. She lives with her family in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, and she is the author of Finishing Lines,<\/a> where she writes about her fear of finishing, living a creative life, and (medical) motherhood. Since 2022, she has been reviewing sustainable home and lifestyle brands, fact-checking sustainability claims, and bringing her sharp editorial skills to every product review. Say hi on Instagram<\/a> or on her website<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Fallon is a Contributing Editor at The Good Trade. She is a writer originally from Houston, Texas and holds an MFA from the Jackson Center of Creative Writing at Hollins University. She lives with her family in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, where she writes about motherhood, artmaking, and work culture. Since 2022, she has been reviewing sustainable home and lifestyle brands, fact-checking sustainability claims, and bringing her sharp editorial skills to every product review. 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