Latest / Journal for Growth / Why Do I Care What Other People Think? | EP 06

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Why Do I Care What Other People Think? | EP 06 · Journal for Growth

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: You know that advice people love to give?
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Stop caring what other people think.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, good luck with that.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: I understand what they're trying to say.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: And most of the time, I think it's pretty good advice.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: But it leaves out something important.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody really explains which opinions we should stop caring about and which ones we probably ought to pay attention to.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: So we're told to stop caring what people think while also being expected to listen to feedback, respect other people's feelings, and consider how our behavior affects them.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Well, which is it?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because those are two very different messages.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: And without understanding the difference, it's pretty easy to get ourselves confused.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if I'm being a complete jerk, I'd appreciate someone pointing it out.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: If I'm doing something that's making everybody around me miserable, that's probably information I should have.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: And if someone knows more about something than I do, I'd be pretty foolish to ignore their advice just because I've decided I'm above caring about other people's opinions.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: And frankly, I like knowing that people enjoy my company.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: I like being respected.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: I like knowing that someone appreciates something I've done.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not particularly interested in becoming completely indifferent to all of that.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: So obviously, some opinions matter, but we don't always care about the ones we should.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: And we can give an astonishing amount of importance to opinions that have absolutely no business running our lives.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: We can even manage to do both at once.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you an example.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine a woman who spent 20 years working at the same job.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: She's good at it, she's dependable, she's the person everyone comes to when something needs to get done.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: She's built a respectable career, earns a decent living, and has good benefits.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: And she's absolutely sick of it.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: Not just having a bad week, she's been unhappy for years.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: The work doesn't interest her anymore.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: She feels as though she's going through the motions, doing what she's always done because, well, that's what she's always done.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: But she has a steady paycheck, a retirement plan, and 20 years of experience.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody tells her how lucky she is to have such a good job.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: So she stays.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: Then one day, she hears about an opportunity.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's a different kind of work, something she's been interested in for years, but never seriously considered pursuing.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: And for the first time in a long time, she gets excited.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: She looks into the position, she talks to the people involved, finds out what the work would actually entail, and starts figuring out whether she could make the change.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: The pay is a little less, the benefits aren't quite as good, and she'd be starting over in a field where she doesn't have nearly as much experience.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: But she really thinks she'd enjoy the work.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: And after considering the financial differences, she believes the trade-offs would be worth it.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: So she decides she's going to apply.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: And then she starts telling people.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother thinks she's crazy to leave a secure job at her age.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: Her sister tells her she should be grateful for what she has.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: And a coworker asks whether she's having some kind of midlife crisis.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's encouraging.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Now she's explaining herself to everybody.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: She talks about why the work interests her, what she's learned about the position, and why she thinks she'd enjoy the change.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: But nobody seems particularly impressed.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother keeps bringing up retirement.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: Her sister talks about the benefits she'd be giving up.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Her coworker thinks the whole thing is ridiculous.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: And the more she talks about it, the less excited she feels.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: A few days later, she's telling herself she should probably just stay where she is.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: After all, she's got a good job.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: She knows what she's doing.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: She's worked hard to get where she is.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: Why throw all of that away?
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: So she doesn't apply.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: And everybody's relieved.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother thinks she's made the sensible choice.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: Her sister agrees.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: Her coworker has probably forgotten the entire conversation.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: And our woman goes back to the same job she's been miserable in for years.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Only now she's a little more miserable.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: Because there was something else she wanted to try.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: And she didn't even give herself the chance.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: But here's what I find interesting.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody actually told her she couldn't apply.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother didn't have the authority to make that decision.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Neither did her sister.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: And her coworkers' opinion about whether she's having a midlife crisis is hardly a professional assessment of her qualifications.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yet somehow all three of them managed to get a vote, and their votes counted more than hers.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the new job might not have worked out.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: She could have discovered that the work wasn't what she expected.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: She might even have regretted leaving her old position if she'd eventually been offered the job and accepted it.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Those were possibilities worth considering.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: But she hadn't reached the point of having to make that decision.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: All she was considering was whether to apply.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: She could have submitted an application, learned more about the position, and decided what to do if she actually received an offer.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, she talked herself out of taking the first step.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: And the interesting part is that she hadn't discovered anything new that made applying a bad idea.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: She'd already considered the differences in pay and benefits.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: She understood that changing careers involved some uncertainty.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Then people started telling her what they thought.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: And she treated their discomfort with the idea as though it were evidence that the idea was wrong.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's quite a leap.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: And the worst part is that she's convinced herself she made a sensible, responsible decision.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: She's not someone who takes unnecessary risks.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: She has obligations.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: She can't just go running off every time something new catches her attention.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: Fine.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: But whose concerns actually determined the outcome?
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: There's a difference between someone pointing out a problem you haven't considered and someone being uncomfortable with a choice they wouldn't make themselves.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Our woman hadn't recognized that difference.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: And she'd allowed other people's reactions to determine whether she even tried.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: A few months later, she's having coffee with a friend.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: She's complaining about work again.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: Same problems, same frustrations, same people driving her nuts.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: And her friend finally says, you know, you had a chance to apply for something different.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, she doesn't appreciate that.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: She explains that the other position wasn't as secure, that she has responsibilities, that she can't just throw away 20 years of experience because she's unhappy.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: And her friend says, Okay, but you were excited about it until everybody started telling you not to do it.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: Ouch.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: Now she's irritated.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: She tells her friend she's perfectly capable of making her own decisions.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: And her friend says, I know you are.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I don't understand why you needed everybody to agree with you.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that pretty much ends that conversation.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody particularly enjoys having a friend point out something they'd rather not consider.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: But later, she starts thinking about what her friend said.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: She remembers how excited she was about the opportunity.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: She'd spent evenings researching it, comparing the benefits, and figuring out what the change might look like.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: She'd decided the position was worth applying for.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Then she started talking to people.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: And suddenly, the same opportunity didn't seem nearly as appealing.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: What had actually changed?
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother hadn't uncovered some hidden problem with the position.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: Her sister hadn't discovered that the company was about to go bankrupt, and her coworker certainly hadn't provided any useful information.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: They just didn't think she should do it.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that had been enough.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: But here's where this gets interesting.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: She was willing to reconsider something she'd spent weeks investigating because a coworker thought it was ridiculous.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yet when a close friend pointed out a pattern in her behavior, she immediately dismissed it.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: Apparently, she cared what people thought right up until they told her something she didn't want to hear about herself.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: Well, isn't that convenient?
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: But there's something else worth considering.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: She hadn't been looking for advice when she told her mother and sister about the new opportunity.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: She was excited.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: She wanted to share something that mattered to her with people she cared about.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: She hoped they'd be happy for her.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, they were concerned.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't understand why she'd want to leave a job they considered so valuable.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: And that was disappointing, which makes sense.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's nice when the people we care about support what we're trying to do.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Their encouragement can mean a great deal to us.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a difference between wanting someone's support and needing their approval before we're willing to move forward.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: Our woman had started out wanting to share something exciting.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: Before long, she was trying to persuade everyone that her idea was reasonable.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: She explained the pay, the benefits, the work, and why she wanted to make the change.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: But she couldn't convince them.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: And as their disapproval continued, she began questioning a decision she'd already considered carefully.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: She'd stopped trying to decide whether the opportunity made sense for her and started worrying about whether the people around her approved of it.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: And when they didn't, she abandoned the idea.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now she's beginning to see something else.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: Not all of those opinions were equally useful.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother's concerns about retirement and financial security were worth considering.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: Those were real parts of the decision, but she'd already considered them.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother also valued security and couldn't imagine voluntarily leaving a dependable job.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: That was her mother's preference.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: It didn't automatically mean the change was wrong.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: And the coworker?
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: He thought changing careers at her age was ridiculous.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, what exactly was she supposed to learn from that?
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: That he wouldn't do it?
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: That he didn't understand why she wanted to?
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: Neither of those things told her much about whether the opportunity made sense for her.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Meanwhile, her friend had noticed something she hadn't wanted to recognize.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: She'd been excited about pursuing an opportunity until she discovered that other people didn't approve.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: That observation deserved some thought, and she'd nearly dismissed it because it made her uncomfortable.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: Which brings us to a rather inconvenient possibility.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: The opinions that bother us most aren't necessarily the ones that deserve the most attention.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: Our woman was so affected by her family's disapproval that she abandoned an opportunity.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Then she was so irritated by her friend's observation that she nearly refused to consider it.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: In both situations, she'd been reacting to how an opinion made her feel instead of examining what the person was actually telling her.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: And now she isn't quite as certain that she handled the situation as sensibly as she'd believed.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: A few weeks later, our woman is having lunch with another friend.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: They've known each other for years.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Their families have spent time together, and she's always thought of her friend as having a pretty good life.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: Nice house, two good incomes, married for years.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: So she's surprised when her friend tells her she's thinking about getting a divorce.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: Are you sure?
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: She asks.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: You two have such a good life together.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't throw that away over a rough patch.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: Her friend looks at her.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: A rough patch?
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: I've been unhappy for 10 years.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's a little unexpected.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: Our woman starts talking about everything the couple has built together: their home, their financial security, all the years they've invested in the marriage.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: And her friend listens for a minute before saying, You don't know what it's like living with him.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: That pretty much puts an end to the discussion.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: They finish lunch, talk about a few other things, and go their separate ways.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: But later that evening, our woman finds herself thinking about what her friend said.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: You don't know what it's like living with him.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: And then she remembers something her mother said when she was considering changing careers.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: You don't know how lucky you are to have that job.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, hell.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: Because suddenly, something becomes rather obvious.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother looked at her career and saw a steady paycheck, good benefits, and 20 years of experience.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: She saw all the things our woman would be giving up, but she didn't know what it felt like to go to that job every morning.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: She didn't experience the frustration, the boredom, or the growing sense that she was spending her working life doing something she no longer wanted to do.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: And our woman had just looked at her friend's marriage and done almost exactly the same thing.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: She saw the nice house, the financial security, and the years they'd been together.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: She saw everything her friend would be giving up, but she knew almost nothing about what it felt like to live inside that marriage.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: Didn't stop her from having an opinion, though, a pretty strong one, actually.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: And she hadn't even bothered asking why her friend wanted to leave before explaining why she shouldn't.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, isn't that something?
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: She'd been so frustrated by other people assuming they knew what was best for her, and she'd just done the same thing to someone she cared about.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: The uncomfortable part is that she really had been trying to help.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: She didn't want her friend to make a decision she'd regret.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: She knew a divorce could have serious financial and personal consequences, and she didn't want her friend to overlook them.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: Those weren't unreasonable concerns.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: But she jumped straight from hearing about the divorce to deciding it was a terrible idea.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: She'd assumed that because the marriage looked good from the outside, it must be worth preserving.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: And her friend had been living inside that marriage for years.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now our woman is remembering the lunch conversation a little differently.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: Her friend hadn't asked her to decide whether she should get divorced.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: She told her something personal and important.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: And our woman had offered a verdict before she even understood the circumstances.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: She could suddenly see how easily our own values and preferences can become the basis for advice that sounds perfectly sensible to us.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: Her mother valued financial security.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Our woman valued the stability she could see in her friend's marriage.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: Both were looking at something from the outside and seeing reasons to preserve it, but neither had to live with the decision.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: And that's a rather important detail.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that doesn't mean we should keep our opinions to ourselves whenever someone discusses a difficult choice.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: We may know something the other person doesn't, or notice a problem they've overlooked.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: And there are times when someone genuinely needs a friend who's willing to say something uncomfortable.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a difference between helping someone examine a decision and trying to convince them to make the decision we'd prefer.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: Our woman is beginning to recognize that difference.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: She thinks about how disappointed she'd been when her mother couldn't understand why she wanted a different career.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: And then she thinks about how quickly she dismissed her friend's unhappiness because the marriage appeared comfortable and secure.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: She wonders what the conversation might have been like if she'd simply asked her friend what had been happening.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: What was making her consider leaving?
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: How long had she been thinking about it?
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: What did she want her life to look like?
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: She might have learned something.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: And she could have offered something more helpful than an explanation of why divorce sounded like a bad idea to someone who wasn't getting divorced.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, she decides to call her friend.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: She apologizes for jumping to conclusions and tells her she'd like to understand what has been going on, if her friend wants to talk about it.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: She doesn't promise to agree with every decision her friend makes.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: She doesn't need to.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: But this time, she's willing to listen before deciding what advice, if any, she has to offer.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's an interesting place for our woman to find herself.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: She started out questioning how much importance she'd given to other people's opinions.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: Now she's questioning how much importance she expects other people to give to hers.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I suspect most of us can think of at least one situation where someone else's opinion has affected us more than we expected.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: You may have reconsidered something you genuinely wanted because someone didn't approve, or dismissed criticism because you didn't like hearing it.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: You might even remember giving someone advice and later realizing you didn't understand their circumstances nearly as well as you thought.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: Any one of those situations would be worth investigating.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: Not because we need to stop caring what people think, but because it would be useful to understand why certain opinions matter so much to us, what they actually tell us, and whether we've been giving them more authority than they deserve.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: And we can look at the other side too.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: When we offer an opinion, are we sharing useful information, raising a legitimate concern, or simply expressing what we'd prefer the other person to do?
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: Do we understand enough about their circumstances to recognize the difference?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: I've created a free companion journaling workbook for this episode to help you explore these questions through a situation in your own life.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: It guides you through identifying an opinion that's affected you, examining why you gave it importance, considering what it actually told you, and deciding whether it deserved the influence you allowed it to have.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: There's also an opportunity to consider how you give your own opinions to other people.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: You'll find the free download link in the episode description.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: There are two versions available.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: One you can print and write in, and another you can type your answers into.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I think there's something worth remembering.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: The people whose opinions influence our lives don't always realize how much authority we've given them.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: And when we're the ones offering advice, we may not realize how much authority someone else is giving us.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's worth thinking about on both sides of the conversation.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining me today.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: Bye for now.