its hard to find a nice balance - but for example..when I was learning guitar i played for peopel they would say "hey thats comming along" now I knew It was shite but it gave me encouragement. I knew what I wanted to hear - and I guess as long as you look at your work and see where you want it to be then thats great.

Sometime though crits are hard to take - but if it is nessesery (due to it being a job) then you have to take it on the chin and learn from it. Dave here always used to crit my work but in the end it helped me - we have an understanding where we know we are not being a-holes but simply honest.