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Why do I care so much what others think!

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  • #80300
    meerkat74
    Participant

    can anyone advise on how to stop caring about what others think of me, There is a person at work who had caused trouble for me and others at work especially when I was very down with depression, they seem to thrive on causing trouble, they have gone off work for a while with an op , and I thought Id be nice and send them a text wishing them well etc. but have not heard back and I wish this wasn’t annoying me so much . Why do I care ? they are not a nice person , I’ve done a nice thing but am still anxious that they don’t like me , I don’t want to feel that they’ve got a hold on me! I read a nice quote yesterday – stop hating the people that hate you and concentrate on loving the people that love you.

    #80302
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear andreamilsomyahoo-co-uk:

    You wrote: “I don’t want to feel that they’ve got a hold on me.” It is true that when I care so much what others think of me, I do give away my power. I give away my peace-of-mind away to THEM, whomever they are. I make my peace-of-mind, my well being DEPENDENT on them, on their response to me, if any. So you sent the text and now it is UP TO THE receiver of your text. How you are feeling now (at the time of typing the above) is UP TO that person. You will feel okay IF that person answers to your text satisfactorily, and you feel not okay for as long as there is no response or .. worse, if there is a negative response.

    I agree with you that giving your well being away to another- and especially to someone who already behaved in a hurtful way to you, someone you do not trust to be kind- is unwise. But this, you already know.

    You asked how to stop caring about what that person thinks of you, how to stop caring what others think of you. Let’s go back to that one person. You sent the text with best intentions. You believed you were doing a nice, kind thing. You felt good about yourself having composed and sent that text. And naturally, since you believed you did a kind thing, you expected the receiver to respond in kindness, to thank you for your gift of kindness. When enough time passed and there was no reply, tension in you grew (I am assuming here, please let me know if this has been so…) and you started thinking: what is wrong? What did I do wrong? And maybe: is that person angry at me? Will he/ she proceed to harm me, somehow? Maybe you thought any of these thoughts, maybe these were automatic thoughts?

    If you think back to your childhood, did you give gifts of kindness to a parent and that parent rejected or not acknowledged those? Did he/ she sometimes punish you, hurt you even though you had no idea it was coming, in spite of your best intentions?

    Maybe your subconscious mind is scanning your present environment for signs that danger is coming based on early experiences.

    This is all theorizing on my part, a maybe thing, a question: could it be so?

    There are quotes about caring about what others think. One I like is: What others think is none of my business.” I wish I could adopt this belief myself. What i am finding out regarding these issues, one has to go back to the origin of one’s very personal, individual experience to find out what makes you tic, personally, individually. That kind of understanding is necessary. What do you think?

    anita

    #80332
    Saiisha
    Participant

    To add to what Anita said so well, I’d like to recommend The Four Agreements, by Don Miguel Ruiz (you should be able to find it on Amazon)

    Two of the four agreements are: “Always do your best” and “Don’t take anything personally”

    Such simple agreements really, but so profound! You did your best in sending that well-wishing text, but try not to take their reaction (or the lack of it) personally! Maybe they’re too sick, maybe their cellphone is dead, maybe they’re suffering in their own mind, maybe they’re jealous – if you notice, these are all their problems, not yours!

    I hope this helps.
    Namaste, Saiisha

    #80335
    Kate
    Participant

    You know – maybe i’m not a big help but i tell you one thing : Don’t worry what others say as long as ones who love you and care about you are all around you. I through my school days i too cared how people thought of me.Also i didn’t looked like usual student. I wore combat boots and leather jacket so i was on lips of everyone.But after some time i stopped to care cause those who cared about me were around me around.

    #80342
    winterfront89
    Participant

    You said: can anyone advise on how to stop caring about what others think of me.
    Why do I care ?

    1) Maybe you care about what others think of you, because you like to please yourself, and in order to please yourself, you need to please others, and by pleasing others, there is a chance they might accept you, and if they accept you, its you who gets the most pleasure out of that, and that’s why you care so much about what other people think of you. In short in order to please yourself you need other people’s acceptance, because that’s how you have learned to accept yourself. You care more about there rating then what you rate yourself. You need to re learn how to please yourself it should not come from other peoples acceptance, your pleasure should come from you accepting yourself. Your value system needs to be you accepting yourself as you are and getting pleasure from that (what i mean is laugh about your imperfections and be kind to your imperfections, no one is perfect!). You do not need to be perfect. You should not have a value-system of yourself that in order for you to feel pleased you need other peoples acceptance.

    Note accepting yourself means just to see yourself as you are without judgement in my opinion.

    2) The second part to the problem is maybe you also hold this strong belief that there is a need to keep this hope alive in you, like its a hopeful possibility that it might work out with them or that person, cuz if i act nicely and do this gesture, then maybe they will respond more nicely or at least act more neutrally towards me. You need to give up that hope. Forget about the hope of possibility of being accepted by others, let go of that weight and just be yourself that is your only purpose when your amongst people. And if you are in the work place be yourself and focus on the task at hand that’s your only job.

    ANYONE WHO HAS DISRESPECTED YOU FROM NOW ON YOU DO NOT NEED TO PLEASE THEM OR BE ACCEPTED BY THEM. YOU JUST NEED TO BE DISTANT AND CORDIAL. YOU SHOULD NOT GET PLEASURED WHEN OTHERS ACCEPT YOU. YOU SHOULD GET PLEASURED WHEN YOU ARE SINCERELY AND GENUINELY BEING YOURSELF. TELL YOURSELF I AM IMPERFECT AND AWESOME AND I WILL NOT BASE MY VALUE SYSTEM ON THE NEED TO BE ACCEPTED BY OTHERS.

    There is this saying, give up all hope and you’ll find freedom, I think Edward Norton said that. The point is give up the hope of being accepted by others. Do not put that unnecessary pressure on yourself. Give it up. Let it go. Its not up to you to figure that shit out. Its a weight that you can let go of. Your focus should be to be kind, civil, be yourself, focus on the task at hand when you are at work, smile, and laugh more often for yourself. Do activities that make u laugh. Let go of the things that are not working out, let the universe figure it out. You cant control the other person you can only control yourself and your actions so let go of the hope of being accepted by others.

    Also I would like to say in caring for someone you are also pleasing them at the same time. You have to be careful who your pleasing. If its someone who disrespects you, than you need to learn to be distant but nice to them. It’s like being distant but at the same time being on point. If its at the work place, if they ask you anything work related you reply exactly whatever they asked you, nothing more or less, and leave it at that. Show them your here to work not to make friends. So be distant, but cordial. If you hear a conversation you would like to jump into, when at work, but the people making the conversation is someone who has been disrespectful to you in the past know better to not join in. People who have disrespected you do not deserve to hear your thoughtful opinions and you do not deserve to be treated that way. Basically honor yourself and value yourself and stay away from people that stink ass because if you don’t later on someway somehow unknowingly or knowingly you will start to (REACT INTO THEIR DRAMA) stink like them, it human nature. We absorb what we see.

    If i said anything that doesn’t apply to you than omit that. I do not know your full story, so forgive me if i said anything offensive.

    Warm Regards,
    From: A Woman
    Age:26
    FROM: Dallas, TX

    #80343
    winterfront89
    Participant

    DANG MY MESSAGE IS LONG!!! LOL!!! SORRY FOR THE GRAMMATICAL AND PUNCTUATION ERRORS.

    #80353
    BlueButterfly
    Participant

    You’re beautiful the way you are. It’s quite natural when someone worries about what the others think about them but it’s the real trouble when it gets too much. Know that most of the people we have met don’t matter into our life everytime, that’s what I learnt myself. I used to be a people pleaser and always spent my days worrying about what people think about me and always believed that they’re right about me whenever they used to judge me. Trust me, it’s a way of suiciding yourself. I realised it and I tried every way to stop thinking about people’s opinion about me. Don’t care about anyone. The real important person is you. You know you’re nice and good. That’s enough! Never ever lower yourself because of people around you and the way they treat you as. They don’t matter at all. You always can change the environment around you. May God bless you, Good luck 🙂

    #80510
    Bethany Rosselit
    Participant

    You’ve got some really good advice here. I just would like to emphasize that other people’s judgments are only hurtful when they are proving our own subconscious assumptions “true.” For example, when I take my daughter to the grocery store, sometimes she throws tantrums. And sometimes people stare or make comments.

    If I know, deep down, that I am a great parent, and that my daughter (who has autism) is just dealing with sensory overload, I can stay calm and these stares and comments don’t phase me. But if I’m having doubts about my parenting ability, the comments will confirm these beliefs that I have about myself, and they will become hurtful. Does that make sense?

    So you may want to look at the reasons that you care so much what other people think. What kind of validation are you seeking from them, that you are not able to provide for yourself?

    Bethany
    http://onlinetherapyandcoaching.org

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