Many of us feel attacked and ignored, when someone is not paying attention to what we’re saying or they are still criticizing us when we’ve put so much effort into the work. When we’re driving slowly because we want to find the perfect location and someone behind you is constantly honking and flashing the headlights. We take it personally and think that they’re criticizing us for driving slowly.
When some cancel an appointment with you at the very last minute, you think and feel that you’re not important enough. How can we overcome this? How can we not take things personally?
What makes us think all this? OUR EGO. Our ego thinks that others should take it into consideration. We want to be heard and acknowledged. We want to be right. Isn’t it? But is that what we want?
We really need to think if we want to be right or happy. Some of us think that being right will make us happy. But this isn’t the case. We’ll still feel left out at some point even if we’re right. So, how to deal with all the negative things that are popping up in our head.
Imagine you invite a friend for a movie and she says that she is busy tonight. And you see on social media that she is having dinner with another friend. You have worked hard on a project and what you have received is just criticism. You come home and want to tell all this and the next person walks away to switch on the TV.
The strategy to deal with this is to think that THIS ISN’T ABOUT ME. If you see all this from other people’s perspective, you’ll understand the situation. If you see two colleagues talking and laughing and seeing you, they laugh. You think that they are making fun of you but this actually has nothing to do with you. Having this sort of mindset requires a lot of determination and training. This takes a lot of effort to correct yourself and say “THIS ISN’T ABOUT ME”.
Our mind usually thinks negatively and it’ll make us think that everything has something to do with us, which actually is not the case. You have to change your mindset. People may attack you, criticize you or ignore you. They can crumple you up with their words, spit you out or even walk all over you. But remember, whatever they do or say, you’ll always keep your value.