When you fly high people will throw stones at you. Don't look down. Just fly higher so the stones won't reach... — Chetan Bhagat

When you fly high people will throw stones at you. Don't look down. Just fly higher so the stones won't reach you

Author: Chetan Bhagat

Insight: There's a real tension in how we handle criticism. Most of us are taught to engage with it—to listen carefully, understand where it's coming from, take what's useful. And that's good advice, usually. But this quote points at something different: the moment when you realize that some criticism isn't actually about improvement. It's about pulling you back down. When you start doing something visible—building a business, sharing your work, standing out in any way—you'll encounter people whose stones aren't thrown to help you improve. They're thrown because your visibility reminds them of their own hesitation. The instinct is to defend yourself, to explain, to look down and address every criticism. But that's exactly the distraction that stops your upward momentum. The non-obvious part? Flying higher doesn't mean ignoring all feedback or surrounding yourself with yes-people. It means becoming clearer about which voices actually matter—the people invested in your real growth versus those just throwing stones from the ground. It's the difference between course-correcting based on wisdom and burning energy on noise. The goal isn't arrogance; it's focus. Some criticism deserves your attention. Most doesn't deserve your time.