I was hyper-focused on what others think of me.
I couldn’t talk because I was super-afraid of people judging me for my expression.
I was constantly worried that I would come across as stupid. And I did because I blabbered with fear when I opened my mouth.
So I became mute and my relationships suffered because of that. I was unable to have any deep meaningful conversations.
I only opened my mouth when somebody asked me a question and it made me super-miserable.
I practiced affirmations chronically to cope with my fear of what others think.
My go-to affirmations were:
“What others think of me is none of my business.”
“Everybody is worried about themselves all the time.”
They helped me temporarily to cope. However, while having a conversation I was thinking about this affirmation rather than being present with the person. And I stifled when the conversations got a little deep.
Also, the constant need to reaffirm these thoughts throughout the day drained me and just amplified my anxiety.
This was the battle inside my mind for 2+ years until I started taking meditation seriously and inquired why I was afraid of what others think.
Because of that, my situation is entirely different now.
I can have deep conversations with anybody. I do things that I love to do without even second-guessing. I’m conducting my first offline group workshop on relieving anxiety next month. Wish me luck.
All this would be still a dream if I didn’t do deep inner work and dissolve my fear of judgement.
Why humans crave approval:
As a kid, your entire universe revolves around your parents.
You were your happy authentic self, but most of your parts are not welcomed by them, since most of them had compromised their authentic selves themselves to fit into society.
So they judge or punish you for behaviors and attitudes that don’t align with their mental state.
So you had to suppress your authenticity to fit in and gain their approval as a survival mechanism. Because unconsciously you believe that you will be abandoned to death if you go against them.
This is the core pattern that installs an approval-seeking virus inside most of us.
This constant need for approval grows and infests your being fully over time and prevents you from being your authentic self and having the courage to explore stuff you really love to do.
You might not even know that you subconsciously still believe as an adult that disapproval is life-threatening, when it’s not.
The Cool Kid paradigm:
“It is impossible to be authentic and to do what other people approve of at the same time”
– Teal Swan
You grow up wanting to be a cool kid who gets all the approval among the friends group.
Because you think that if you gain as much approval as you can, you can finally give yourself permission to be yourself.
So you get obsessed with perfecting everything about you, from your teenage:
- the way you speak.
- the way you dress.
- the way you walk.
to make sure that everybody likes how you present yourself.
This condition gets chronic as you grow older.
Most adults are obsessed with putting on an act to get that dose of approval.
The truth is, no matter how perfectly you display yourself to the world, there will be people who dislike you and it will crush your confidence, if you are an approval seeker.
And even if everybody likes you for the performance you put on, you have to live with this constant anxiety and pressure of living up to the false standards you have set for yourself.
Existing as a shadow of your true self:
If you constantly worry about what others think, you cut yourself off short in almost all domains of life:
- You struggle to connect with people because of your inability to be vulnerable and express yourself authentically. You can only have plain boring conversations.
- You seek approval for anything you do. So you play it safe to satisfy people and don’t risk trying any creative stuff that might change your life.
- You suffer from lack of confidence and self-hate, because you believe your worth depends on other people’s reactions to you.
- You become a nice guy/lady who says yes to everything to gain approval. You attract people who use and disrespect you because of your condition.
These are only a few examples. There are 1000 other ways how fear of what others think makes you anxious and miserable.
I guess you don’t want to continue living a compromised life like this. So that’s why an internal shift needs to happen – giving yourself approval to be yourself fully and live an authentic fulfilled life.
Transcending the fear of what others think – Living an authentic life:
Let’s get practical and explore the 3 steps that will help you transcend the fear of what people think and start aligning with your authentic self:
1. Ask yourself why?
Stop looking for temporary fixes or forcing new behaviours to gain approval from others. Instead, dive deep into why you need approval from them in the first place.
Catch yourself when you feel the urge to seek approval from other people to express or do something.
Pause and ask yourself why your own approval is not enough.
Be open and sit with the question every time you catch yourself seeking approval. The real answer which will be a painful feeling you avoid, will come to you.
2. Sit with the feeling of disapproval:
When you explore the why behind your need for approval, you will come across the feeling of why you fear disapproval in the first place.
You might start to feel loneliness, abandonment, rejection, etc. that came with the disapproval of your authentic self during your childhood.
Sit with that feeling of disapproval. Feel them fully. Give love and compassion to those parts of you that were disapproved.
Once you feel the feeling of what disapproval means to you, you will free yourself slowly to express your authentic self.
This is how you heal the pattern of approval-seeking.
3. Approve yourself from within:
Moving forward, Give yourself permission to express yourself fully.
- If you want to try a new hobby, give yourself approval to try it.
- If you want to sing, give yourself approval to sing.
- If you want to travel, give yourself approval to travel.
If you feel resistant to doing what you love, ask yourself why and stay open like you did in the previous steps.
You don’t need permission from anybody to do what you love. If you wait for permission from others to be yourself, you will be waiting all your life.
The truth is nobody can approve or disapprove of you. Because nobody is living your life and knows you fully other than you.
And that’s when you attract people who love you for who you are, not for what they think you should be. That’s when life gets really beautiful.
Practice these 3 steps to bring an internal shift within yourself and blossom into your happy authentic self.
P.S. If you want 1-1 guidance from me to relieve your anxiety and reconnect with your happy authentic self within 8 weeks, book a free clarity call here.