“I don’t care about what
other people think of me” is a phrase that I have been unable to utter, my
entire life. I have always wondered at the amount of times I’ve read that
phrase or versions of it in interviews and heard successful people tout it in
terms of their successes. There’s a good chance that you, yeah, you, reading
this right now, think, “I don’t care what anyone thinks about me, and I never
have, big deal”; meanwhile, I’m over here thinking, “yeah that’s great, good for you
because it is a strong quality to have, but I could never not care about that.”
I have always thought
that as a people-pleaser, someone who is emotionally crippled at the thought of
someone being upset at me, disappointed in me, or just plain doesn’t like me,
caring about what other people think is simply a part of me. It's my burden to bear. I could never
change. I never thought it was an issue, really; in fact, I’ve often wished I
could know how others saw me so I could have a better sense of what my good
qualities are, what to change and how to improve. In other words, I have used
my imagined sense of others’ opinions of me as a benchmark for my own personal
success.
A little tweak of the
way I dress here, a little twist of the way I talk there, I will confess that I
have slanted myself here and there in order to be the person that [I think] others
know me to be or want me to be or expect me to be. (That was hard to write because I’m not
proud of this.) These slight variations don’t go deep enough to compromise my
true self, but they are enough make me appear a bit wishy-washy at times.
I have finally,
slowly, been able to uncover the truth of the matter: that this is a problem because I’m letting my
own personal colours bleed into the colours of others, and letting those
colours bleed into mine, creating a muddy puddle of non-colour, much like the
cup of dirty water you use to clean a paint brush in over and over again.
By trying to be
several interpretations of one person, I just become a muddy puddle of
non-colour. What’s more is that this is all based on my perceptions; nobody
knows what anyone else actually thinks. We’ll never know what people actually
think; only what they choose to say. Everyone is entitled to their opinions anyway, whether they voice them or not. And honestly, we all probably don’t spend
all that much time thinking about other people and what we like about them and
what we don’t. And if we knew, it would be overwhelming, confusing, and ultimately not
worth worrying about. Right?
This type of muddy
puddle person is not the type of person that people like—a crushing revelation
to someone who is trying to gain approval! Be yourself, right? This is what people say all the time. After all, isn’t it refreshing to
hear someone say something true and honest, even if it is a shock? I love it
when someone speaks their mind without restraint or without painting it a
different colour than it actually is. Raw honesty is so beautiful.
I’ve finally begun to
notice the negative effects of this way of thinking—of all the caring about
what people think. The muddy puddle. The subsequent deeper question of who I
really am—who one really is. The feeling of “not fully myself” vs. the
confident feeling of “really myself.” I have started to see a glimpse of the
crucial importance of outlining myself in some black permanent marker so my
colours don’t bleed as much and diffuse into a grayish puddle of non-colour.
A huge part of not
caring about what other people think is letting go of things we can hold onto
as measurements of value. Letting go of trying to please people when the true
you just can't because your values don’t line up with that other person’s—and
being OK with being different. Letting go of the conception of beauty that you
are trying to embody when your own physical features just can’t reflect that
conception of beauty (instead, they reflect your own conception of beauty—your own
kind of beautiful). Letting go of whatever others expect you to be—letting go
of needing to be just that—by getting to know yourself better so you can
properly understand your own outlines and just what shape you take. Letting go of wanting to be something else and instead accepting the person you are, the space you occupy, the specific type of influence you hold. By
understanding these aspects of yourself, you can determine how you feel you
need to improve upon what you already are, rather than stretching in weird
positions to jump over to another, completely “not you” conception of yourself.
(It’s awkward.)
I can’t believe how
many years I have been governed by the pressure to guess what others have
thought and modify accordingly, waiting for a tidbit of approval to keep me
going. I’m throwing this out into the open with the hopes that it will give me
some accountability to step out of my muddy puddle and stay out of it.
I hope that this can
shed some light for anyone else out there who has cared too much about what
other people think—cared to the point of allowing the opinions of others to affect
your expression of yourself to the world. Reinforce your own colours by
outlining your values, your awesome personality traits, your passions and your
strengths so that your colours brighten up and are clearer and more visible to
the world. We need you and your bright colours because nobody else reflects
them in quite the same way that you do!
Talk to me or message me about your thoughts on this topic! How have you been able to ignore or walk past the opinions of others? What gives you confidence in yourself? How do you walk the straight line without wavering to the right or the left?
