Guilt

I volunteer for a website that reviews books and music. I moved from simply reviewing items to be a part of requesting the items. During the schoolyear, as I'm teaching, I didn't really make time for it and I thought that now that it was summer, I'd make more requests. And so I sent off my requests, and now I've been told off for not doing things properly.


In my defense, I was never given any guidelines, but now I'm left with a stack of books sent to me that serve no purpose since they were published over 6 months ago, and therefore I could write the most insightful and witty reviews of the books, but no one would ever see them. Should I send them back? Do I keep them and just pretend it's OK that the publisher will now never get their books reviewed

And is it OK for me to be defensive because I was never told the right way to do things? That is my go to move for confrontation, and I suppose anyone's really. Our egos are such that it can be hard to take criticism. And instantly all the reasons that we're right and the other person is wrong are clear and obvious to us.

In this case, I suppose it is more of me not knowing the right way to do something. And so it's simply someone providing guidance for future efforts, and not completely a criticism. But hearing that I've done something not right, whether I should have known better or not, leaves me feeling slightly ill. As though I've finished my third plate at an all you can eat pizza buffet. Not enough to cause any actual damage, but enough to feel bad (physically or otherwise) for a day or so.