Why care about what people think?

There will always come a time where you hear people talk about you. Criticize you, or pass comments about you.

No one gets through life without someone at least disliking you. Disapproving of what or how you do things. It’s just the way the world is, people will always have opinions.

I can’t count the countless times. When I’ve encountered people, who comes to tell me about how worried they are. all because of what other people think about them or their actions.

Approval from others gives us a higher sense of self-esteem. We’re convinced that their recognition matters to our self-worth and how deeply we value ourselves. — Tom Ferry, CEO of YourCoach

Ferry has a point right there. We crave for other people’s approval. It shows us that we’re accepted, we’ve done the right thing. We’re normal.

Social media hasn’t helped us in that front. With the rise of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to name a few, we’ve grown to want people to ‘like’ the things we post online.

We want people to like us. There’s nothing wrong with that! Don’t feel that because you want people to like you, you’re wrong. But, there is a caveat to that.

It is inevitable for us to want attention, want people to approve of us, to like us. Much like of a child would want the approval of his/her parents. That child wants their parents to be okay with it, because they are his/her role model.

It is okay to seek approval, but there must be a line you need to draw. Approval is good. And other people’s opinions can turn into constructive criticism for you to improve yourself.

Never let it define you.

There’s one too many encounters that I’ve experienced that have people let what others say/think about them define who they are. They listen to people, and let the social norm define them, be who they are.

Care about what other people think and you will always be their prisoner. — Lao Tzu

Many a man has taken other’s words and morphed themselves to those words. They’ve betrayed themselves and have succumbed to what others say.

The question that I always bring up to them, is why?

Why let other people make you feel insecure? Let what others say change you to be someone who isn’t you? If there’s one responsibility in this world, is for you to be true to yourself. You owe yourself that much.

Opinions are just that, opinions. People are entitled to their own thoughts. But, they are not entitled to force those thoughts and belief down your throats and make you heed to it.

What you do, it’s your life. Not theirs. So why do you give them power to change it? Sure if it is good and constructive, by all means, let it influence you. But if it isn’t something that you belief in, do you want to live in a lie?

They don’t know. How can they know what’s best for you? Your needs are only known to you, until you make it known to others. So for you to listen to someone who thinks your idea is stupid. You’re just prohibiting yourself from working towards what you need.

Your true potentials will be hindered. Look at all the successful people in the world, it all started out with a crazy or ambitious dream. Heeding to other people’s opinions will stop you dead in your tracks.

People’s opinions tend to change, that’s why you can sway people. So why listen to something that can change a day or two later? Life’s too short for you to live someone else’s life.

You can be frantic and frazzled about what others think. What about how they feel about what you think? A lot of people out there don’t care enough to bat an eye on your opinion. So why should you?

There’s also this one other factor that you need to consider on why you shouldn’t care so much about what other people think about you.

It’s impossible to please everyone; you’re not born to please either.

So quit trying, and do by right of yourself!