How much are you willing to bend to please the people who don’t actually matter? What are you willing to do fit in with the ‘Cool Kids’? What compromises are you willing to make to have complete strangers be in awe of who they think you are?
Maybe it’s just a bit. What is one teeny, tiny shift away from what you truly believe? Who cares if you don’t really agree with the angry mob? No sense stirring up trouble. The important thing is being liked.
Perhaps that isn’t what you say to yourself, but it’s how you act. Whenever you try to fit in, when you bend this way and that to please anyone and everyone. It’s what you do when you don’t say what you are really thinking, what you truly believe in. When you copy what everyone else is doing.
We hear a lot about authenticity. It’s one of those favorite guru buzzwords. But do we truly understand what it means? Do we really know what is it to be authentic? The short answer is no. The long one is how can we understand what it means when what we really want is to be liked?
The little old lady who dropped the f-bomb in the post office? She’s authentic. Everyone else? Not so much. She doesn’t give a rip what anyone thinks of her. She doesn’t mind holding up the line or wonder if the giggles were because of her shocking language. The people who don’t matter to her don’t exist.
That’s why I love what Erika Napoletano has to say on the subject. She tells why we need to stop apologizing and start being honest. She shares why we need to embrace who we really are and know that we aren’t going to be everyone’s (as she says of the Class Valedictorian who tried to tell her who she should be) “target demographic”.
Thank you, Erika for saying what no one else has had the courage to say! Watch her TEDx Talk on Rethinking Unpopular
Oh and btw, she has a kickass book on the topic called, “The Power of Un-Popular”!
3 Comments
You’re super kind, Carla. Thanks so much for sharing my talk! I’m all smiley this morning…
Rethink unpopular=start being honest. I sure am glad she brought up “bat shit crazy”. Some people are that when they try to be honest. Lol.
I do still stand behind “if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all” but if you ask me, you are asking for honesty, most of the time. Ok, it depends on “that time of the month.” To what degree you will get honesty or raving mad rambling.
I am one that keeps my mouth shut most of the time and that sure does bother my honest big more extroverted friends who I love dearly. But at the same time, I rarely complain. I am one of those that lets things roll off my back. Some say complacent. I call it “I don’t give a shit.” BUT, I think if you don’t say something in the first place, then don’t complain later.
I turned 40 this year (shh don’t tell anyone, except all the Momeo readers and all my friends I shared this post with on FB) and I realized I didn’t care what people thought anymore. It took all those years. It is so liberating. I didn’t care if I was unpopular anymore. Doesn’t mean I went around telling everyone i hated how I really felt, I would be run out of town, lol. But I stopped apologizing so much. And that is what rang true for me. Thanks Erika for bringing that up. Stop apologizing for being yourself.
~Allie
You bet, Allie 🙂