I am going to share four key points on this subject that helped me self-reflect and live a relatively better life. i have read and saved it from a fellow discord user. So full credit goes to this kind unknown stranger on the internet.
Constantly ruminating about what others think of you can hinder you from reaching your true potential. However, it’s sadly, like everything in life, easier said than done. It’s hard to deny how important it feels to be seen, acknowledged and respected by others which is why we subconsciously seek approval from others.
So enough rambling, here are the four key points.
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**Allow people to come and go out of your life as they choose.**
Make a commitment to allow *everyone* in your life to come and go out of your life as they please. Let this apply to friends, peers, lovers, parents, children, and partners.
For example, are you trying to guilt-trip or manipulate people into sticking around? Are you trying to be super nice to them so that they’ll stay? Are you putting on a performance of some kind so they’ll like you?
See clearly that this is a losing game! All of this mental energy that goes into holding people in your life should be allocated to your life’s purpose.
Commit now to release all of your effort to *pull* people in, or *hold* them close.
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**Allow people to think whatever they’re going to think.**
See clearly – beyond any doubt – that it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks about you. Let people see you the way they want to see you. Let people judge you! Make a commitment to yourself to release all attempts to control other people’s thoughts/opinions about you, because there’s no way you can control what others think so Just let all of that go. You can do this now, if you choose.
You’re not here to be some watered-down version of yourself that makes everyone happy. You are here to step deeper into your uniqueness, your authenticity. This is how you best serve yourself and the world.
**Put everything on ‘Red’.**
Keep death close. Know, beyond any doubt, that you’re going to die, and live your life accordingly. If you knew you were going to die soon, but you still had a few weeks or months to go – what would you do? What would you create, study, explore, or express? What is in you to be manifested in the world? For what are you waiting for permission to do? And what’s risky about taking a new, bold step in this direction?
Take everything and put it on the ‘red’ square at this roulette table. The possibility of failure, embarrassment, and disappointment. Take on a willingness to experience these things despite how unwanted they might be. Decide that this is a worthwhile risk.
**Take yourself and your life seriously.**
Sometimes we can come under the impression that we don’t matter, that our lives don’t matter, that we don’t have any significant value to offer to the world. This would be a mistake. Your presence is valuable in this world, and it’s needed. The more you offer yourself respect, time, space, understanding and encouragement, the more mature you grow and the more you become a contribution to the species. This is serious work, and there’s no time to waste trying to modify your behaviour to gain the approval of others.
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You got this! You are going to be the best version of yourself if you aren’t already. I am rooting for you! Much love.
Edit: I made a comment on how one may possibly start practicing these key points, if you are interested 🙂
22 comments
Yes. Chase excellence, not people !
Thank you for this amazing read!!❤️🤟
I truly appreciate and needed this. Thank you
The first one IMO is the most important
By always recognizing that nothing lasts forever, you can open yourself to change around you and you won’t feel terrified as much to see them go away
slapped me hard, thanks! great read.
Posts like this are why I decided to join Reddit, Thank you!
Damn this is pretty good! I think I just realized recently that I have social anxiety. I’ve been denying it for months that I don’t care what other people think about me but in reality, I put their opinions about me on a pedestal and even become depressed with the thought of someone disliking me which is utterly idiotic.
I’ll save this post and put into heart the lessons it teaches but I bet it will be a grueling task.
Thank you for this!
“Memento Mori” – or we are mortals.
Nothing, or no one stays forever.
I’ve been giving less shits to other people and much more focused on things I redeem as more values to me.
Great post thanks
This is beautiful, thanks for sharing
If I didn’t hide my whole personality I’d have no one left at all. There’s not a single person in this world who would care about a bundle of anxiety with no other traits. That’s literally my personality I don’t have any other traits
Thank you for this!
Great advice, and helpful ways to think through this issue. Thank you!
You wanna know what others think of you? They don’t! They think about themselves, everyone does. A passing thought might come your way but at the end of the day you’re the one who has to be happy with yourself because you’re the one who thinks about you the most
For anyone looking for more insight on each point:
Numbers 1 and 2 come as a result of mindfulness (in this case, being mindful of your attachment to other people and to the idea that other people have to think a certain way). This can be practiced with meditation.
Number 3 is a little more difficult to practice, but it’s a concept hit on in r/Stoicism very often (“Memento Mori” (thanks u/Great-Ingenuity ). So if you want to look into it more, I’d recommend checking out Stoicism.
Number 4 comes with time and self-actualization of how much you are worth. As we navigate this world, our brains try to make sense of stuff. So, it looks at a lot of past experiences to form conclusions of ourselves. These are usually negative (if you don’t feel you put value in this life) and the person starts internalizing these beliefs as their core beliefs.
“i received an A on science. Mom and dad weren’t happy and yelled. Seems like if i can’t get an A+, i am not doing good; ergo i am a bad person.” – (A personal example of how i used to think)
The reality of core beliefs is that they not only shape your thoughts but also change your perception of how you view things. Every time that something happens, either good or bad, you are more likely to amplify the bad and essentially mute the good if you have a poor self-image. This leads to more negative self-talk that internalizes into more core beliefs, thus continuing this vicious cycle of self-hate.
The key is to understand this and be understandable to ourselves about failures or bad things in life. We are humans, we make mistakes, we matter. Don’t box yourself with the negative crap your mind says about you. <3
>See clearly – beyond any doubt – that it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks about you.
But it does. The way people see me affects the way they act toward me, which affects me. My coworkers disliking me actually does decrease the chance of me getting a promotion.
>because there’s no way you can control what others think so Just let all of that go.
But I can. I can’t exactly “control” what other think of me but I have significant influence over it. I can control it to a pretty major degree.
Thank you, stranger. I felt something welling up inside me, as it usually does, when somebody is giving advice on these matters. But it was a well thought out thing. I cannot disagree.
My issue is the opposite of wanting to be noticed. I wish I was invisible/others couldn’t see me so I could go outside with less anxiety. Feeling visible and feeling like I’m noticably taking up space just cripples me. If a stranger initiates it’s “omg danger” – and well, if I’m keeping to myself the stranger tends to be a male making a sexual comment or noticing me in that way. Which just triggers sexual trauma that caused me to become nonfunctional with intense social anxiety and agoraphobia to begin with. And considering that I’m chronically suicidal, the topic of mortality is a loaded one. Living every day like death is certain kinda just bolsters the desire for it to happen sooner rather than later. And well, if I’m dying there’s no point in trying or going through it all. It doesn’t matter if I’m unhappy or nothing gets better.
I really need to get a therapist 😅.
It’s just so hard.
>Allow people to come and go out of your life as they choose.
>Commit now to release all of your effort to pull people in, or hold them close.
Do this and you’ll end up lonely. You have to realize that maintaing a relationship requires effort and sometimes you have to commit to it to improve it. If people didn’t even try to stay together, no partnership would ever work, and we’d all be lonely and miserable because according to your advice, it’s not even worth trying to keep someone close to you. I consider this terrible and destructive advice.
>that it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks about you.
If you care about your friends and family in any way you must recognize that *it does matter what other people think about you*. There is good reason why we have evolved to adapt to other peoples preferences, because we want to establish long lasting relationships, in which both parties like each other. If other people don’t like you, you have two choices, either let everyone around you go and become a loner or actively improve your situation and personality to appeal to others. We don’t try to look beautiful for no reason, we want others to like us, and that’s healthy and good.
Can’t please everyone.
This makes me think about social media. Facebook especially. I mean if you accept people coming and going in your life, what’s the purpose of Facebook?
It can’t be healthy when people leave your life, but then you still see them on Facebook living out their lives when you two don’t talk anymore.