If it’s not going to matter in five years, don’t let yourself stress over it for more than five minutes. Feel your feelings. You don’t have to be a robot. But if something isn’t going to matter in the grand scheme of things, let it roll off your shoulders. Why stress out over something that has already happened and that you can’t change? Try to remedy the situation or learn from your experience/get better so that same thing doesn’t happen again.
Tag: care
Speak up for things you care about, but let the rest go
Don’t get pulled into arguments or debates over things that don’t matter to you. Be prepared to lose some battles by biting your tongue when needed or by compromising on things you don’t feel strongly about so that you can “win” the things you do care about. If you nitpick every little thing, always trying to win every argument, your words will carry less weight when you actually need to “win” an argument about something you care deeply about.
If it doesn’t matter to you, or if you don’t have a strong opinion about something, don’t get worked up and bent out of shape when discussing it. Ask yourself how whatever it is you’re talking about actually affects you and your loved ones. If it doesn’t have any major repercussions, let the other person do what they want without you trying to force your advice on them.
On care
You can be very knowledgeable and “have the answers” that others are looking for, but until they know how much you care – how passionate you are about that topic, how interested you are in their well-being, how much you understand what it means to them – that’s when you win them over.
Just like in most things in life, it’s not about you. People’s first thoughts tend to default to thoughts about themselves. You can say it’s selfish, but it’s true. That’s why people tell you to be interested in others, to listen twice as much as you talk, to ask questions about them, to use the other person’s name in conversation…they want to know (or at least think) you care about them. If they believe that, you will earn their trust and then they will be more receptive to your “knowledge.”
Responding to the haters
Leave the hurtful, mean-spirited comments from others on the ground like it’s a flaming bag of dog turd. Even if you stomp it out (by responding), you’ll carry around the smell of poop with you.
Ignore the haters. Know who you are and which people’s opinions you actually value. Don’t get too high or too low by the feedback from those who don’t know you or care about you.
