Caring what other people think

In this episode, we’re diving into one of the most universal human struggles: caring what other people think.

Not in the “just don’t care!” kind of way, because that’s not real, but in the honest, messy, human way that actually helps you shift it.

I’m sharing stories from my own life, a powerful moment with a former coach, what came up on last night’s free group coaching call, and how this shows up in parenting, entrepreneurship, and identity.

We’ll talk about why we’re wired to seek approval and how to slowly unhook your worth from other people’s opinions.

If you’ve ever felt judged, misunderstood, overly agreeable, invisible, or too worried about what people might think… this one’s for you.

And if you're interested in taking this work deeper and bringing these podcasts to life, sign up for the next monthly free group coaching call.

https://www.tamarcoaching.com/group

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:13

Friends. Hello. How you doing, friends? Welcome back, brave little things. Brave Little Things in Action. What is going on? What is going on, guys? You know what's going on? Winter is freaking going on. And if you've been around here for a bit, you know I do not thrive in winter. No, I do not. I am a summer girl through and through, summer baby, born in the summer, thrive in the summer. I keep hoping one year I'll wake up and suddenly be that cozy winter person who's like, yeah, bring me layers. Yeah, bring me the darkness. And winter's like, yeah, girl, ain't gonna happen. I mean, I'm just I'm cold all the time. I'm confused. The sun disappears way too early. Basically, either like wrapped up in like a hundred million layers, like I'm not even joking. I've got tank top, long sleeve shirt, maybe two, a sweater, and a sweatshirt, and like crazy thick socks and slippers, like all the time. Or I'm or if it's not that, then I'm also in a hot shower. Hot showers do the trick as well. But I don't know. But I will say, for my own, you know, cheering my own self on, I am getting better year and year after year after year. I've softened a bit, a little less resentful, a little bit more open. And, you know, there are absolutely amazing things about winter. I love, I mean, especially here in Israel, the truth is that it's it's never that cold. Inside, it's cold. That's the problem. Outside, it's actually gorgeous, green, lush. No one's at the sea. I'm like, beachwalks are unbelievable. Sunsets are insane, sunrises are insane. So there's actually amazing stuff. I'm allowing myself to, you know, be open to that. But I think I'm just like, I'm just a summer person, so there it is. But I am getting better at that. Wondering how what you guys are. Are you summer people? Are you winter people? Are you fall people? Are you spring people? What are ya? I'd love to know. Anyway, enough of that. Today we're talking about a little topic that's quite a big topic for most of us, which is about not caring what other people think about you. And this really is a sister episode to last week's episode, which was Standing Your Ground, the End of the Good Girl Era. Do you guys like that title? Good one, huh? So they kind of go hand in hand whether this one should go first and then that one, or the Standing Your Ground, the End of the Era, Good Girl, Second, whatever it is. I think you could figure out for yourself, but they definitely go hand in hand. You know, these are they belong together. So if you haven't listened to the other one, definitely jump in and take a listen after this one. You know, last night on my monthly free group coaching call, every single woman who came brought up some version of this theme. I don't want them to think this. I'm scared they'll judge me about that. I'm worried what they'll say. Which makes total sense. This pops up constantly for most of us. And I'm not gonna sit here and be like, just don't care. Who cares? Who cares what they think? Because that besides it not working, it also is not the way we should be. It's not how the way we're built. I think there's actually some benefits of, you know, really listening to what other people have to say on some level. And the bottom line is whether it works or not, we do care. You care, I care, humans care. And no no matter how long I've been a coach for or building businesses or whatever it is, like there's always gonna be a part of me. I know this. And the moment I stop fighting it, this is actually where it was like, okay, I'm okay with this, is like that there's gonna be a little part of me that's gonna care. So the goal isn't to suddenly eliminate this instinct, it's to turn the volume down so it stops running our lives. Because that's really the issue here, right? It's like it's okay for it to be there. It's just that when it's like running our lives and we get consumed and we spend all day tripping out about some comment that someone wrote or some, you know, reply on our emails that they sent, and like all day, instead of businessing and parenting and partnering and friending and being alive or like caught up in this one little message that this one person just dropped down and probably never thought about ever again, because that's how human we humans are. But it's like something that we trip out on. We care, you know. Listen, look, we care because we're wired for caring or wired for belonging. Approval used to equal used to equal survival. Your nervous system still thinks if people disapprove of you, something terrible will happen, right? It's like literally like if you do not belong, if people do not like you, you do not get to be part of the tribe, which means that you do not get to search for water and hunt for food and build shelter shelters together. I mean, that's literally what the equivalent is and why our brains freak out about it. So let's start by dismantling the biggest lie underneath all of this, which is what is the biggest lie underneath all of this, I wonder, right? It's that someone likes someone liking you makes you lovable. And someone not liking you makes you less lovable, which is not even close. It's something like this. Let's let's take winter. Since we spoke about winter just earlier, let's talk let's take winter, for example. All right. I don't love winter, as you guys know, and as I just shared. My husband loves winter. He can't freaking wait to break out those hoodies, let me tell you. He loves a cold, brisk walk in the forest with the leaves and the cold air on his skin. He loves it. My opinion doesn't make winter good or bad. His opinion doesn't make it more lovable. Winter is just winter, summer's just summer. And we are exactly the same. Your lovability isn't determined by whether someone approves of you. You don't become more lovable because someone likes you. And you don't lose any worth because someone doesn't get you or doesn't vibe with you or has judgments about you. Got it? Winter is not more lovable because my husband loves it, and winter is not less lovable because I don't like because I don't like winter. It's just not how it works. And you know, let's take also, you know, parenting, I think, is like a really a really good thing to be thinking about when you're thinking this mind frame. So let's take it parenting for a second. Because this is a place where this shows up for me, I'll say for me personally, big time. My daughters are so different for me. They're so different for me. And it's always so surprising because I always thought since like forever that I my kids would be just like me. Am I alone in this? I don't know, guys. What do you think? I thought they were gonna look just like me, they're gonna be just like me. Like it was very confusing to me. I mean, the truth is that my girls both there's very similarities, especially when they're little, they look like my little version. But they've as they've grown, they look differently. They look like each other's sisters, but they definitely are really different than me. They love makeup, they love perfume, they love smelling like completely artificial smells, which this is the worst for me. They love the glam, they don't love hiking, they don't want to be in nature the way I do. I mean, I have to be really aware of my reactions. So I don't accidentally teach them that they need to be some version of me or some version of me that I like to feel connected or loved, or that they are lovable because of that. They get to be who they are, and I get to be me, and that's the whole point. And it's it's like definitely easier said than done. It is definitely a life's work, and I'm working on it all the time, especially I think as a parent to try to disconnect, like they are actually different humans than you are, they're not meant to be the same human, but it's really a worthy and valuable lesson to teach our kids. You don't need to be anything in order to be lovable. You are exact you are lovable, period. Okay, now this brings me back to something I shared last week about my own good girl tendencies on episode, you know, the end of the good girl era. So, you know, my own good girl tendencies would come out, especially around authority figures. When I, you know, join a new coaching container or start learning from someone, I watch myself like slide in very smoothly into this overly agreeable, overly positive, people-pleasing mode. It's like I'm a whole different personality. Or like I'm like I'm like me, but like turned up a hundred times with an added addition of other things. It can be creepy and weird and it kind of freaks me out sometimes, especially since I've brought awareness to it. But it's just this mode where like I if I join like a new, I saw this, you know, I've seen this a few times since I've become a coach because I'll be like join, you know, working with a new coach, being in a group coaching program, that kind of stuff. But in 2023, when the Gaza Israel War broke out, and I'm not gonna share any other details, but those things, and I know everybody here knows what I'm talking about, something inside of me shifted, and not because I suddenly became someone who doesn't care what people think, but because I was like forced to choose my own clarity over someone else's approval. I like actually want to read to you a message I sent to my coach, a coach I admired deeply, someone whose approval I had always unconsciously and very consciously wanted. This is the first time I ever responded in a way that wasn't softened or filtered or made polite for someone else's comfort. And it was a huge deal for me. All right, so let me just like read to you, and I'm gonna read you a part of it. There was a lot of back and forth that we had, but I basically said to her, and I basically I did say to her, I'm no longer in a place where I need anyone, even my coach, to understand mine and my people's fight. I believe you have a good heart, and this is where it a lot of this is coming from. But let me be clear that I don't need you to understand. I don't need you to understand. I live very far you live, sorry, you live very far from this reality and truly could never understand. As someone on the ground living this nightmare reality, I'm a hundred percent a hundred percent certain my people are doing exactly what any people would do when they are fighting off so much evil. And again, we went we went on, we went back and forth, but my tone and my what I was giving over was exactly the same. I really had this major let go, even as this big coach that I put on the pedestal and you know just thought so highly of. I was just like, to me, she does not understand, and I don't need to I don't need to spend a minute here trying to explain this. This is not for me to explain. And I literally walked away. And I actually I looked, I walked away and haven't haven't turned around since. This moment was huge for me. Not because she agreed, she definitely did not, and not because she understood, because I don't think she did, but because I finally asked myself, what do I believe? Instead of what I was asking the whole time is what will she think of me? It was like this like identity shift in this moment. Of course, it never is not a moment, there's like all these little moments that add up to it, but that's what happened. And there was not the disappearance of caring, but there was kind of like this reorganization of what matters most to me. And that exact thing leads straight into one of the frameworks that I teach all the time, both here on the podcast and in my coaching container. So I'm sure you've heard it before, but I'm gonna share it again, and it's something I shared last night again in my coaching call. There are three types of business. There are only three. There are three types of business only in our lives. There's your business, there's their business, and there's God's business. Of course, God can be replaced with anything that makes you feel comfortable and where you connect, whatever that is. But everything in life falls into one of those three categories. Your business is your thoughts, your feelings, your actions, your choices, your reactions, your decisions, your values, the things you can you actually can control. Their business, right? That means anybody, any human being that is outside of you, their business is other people's opinions, judgments, preferences, choices, beliefs, emotions, reactions, values, theirs. Right? Even if they have an opinion about you or a thought about you, a reaction about you, that still is their business. That is not your business. You cannot control this. You can try. You definitely can try, and we all do. But at the end of the day, you're not gonna be able to. I promise you that. I have tried. I have tried many, many times. It has just left me frustrated, exhausted, and like completely the opposite of feeling like I'm in control. Okay, last one is obviously God's business, which is, you know, all of our circumstances, our outcomes, things that are bigger than us, things that unfold without our permission, which can be very frustrating, but it's the bottom line. And when you're in your business, you feel grounded. You feel like, okay, I can take care of stuff, I can make things happen, okay, right? But when you're in their business or in God's business, you feel anxious, you feel frustrated, you feel powerless. You know, last night on one of my clients, you know, who was coaching, was struggling with both of these things. Her family had lots of opinions about how she runs her life, how she spends her time, how she chooses her priorities. And she kept trying to manage their thoughts so she could feel better. She kept on, she was mostly just like very frustrated. She was left like very frustrated that they thought these things about her. And on top of that, she also had one foot in God's business and wanting God to change certain circumstances in her life faster and differently. And she was exhausted. She was exhausted emotionally, mentally, spiritually, like, you know, she was in tears, literally. And I told her, you know, you don't have to want to let go of controlling them or controlling God. But the reality is you never had that job to begin with. You know, I know you thought think you did. And and you feel like, you know, like I want to be able to control those things. But the bottom line is you never had control ever. Even if you thought that no, you could work really hard to get it, it never could happen. And there was real grief for her, for sure, because it felt like a loss of control. But that there was never control there in the beginning with. There was nothing to lose because she never had that control. You know, in that same moment when you can accept that their business is their business, and God's business is God's business. There's also this huge wave of relief. Because now you actually have energy to put back into your business what you can think, what you can do, what you can decide, what you can change, what you can create. That's what she was like feeling. She was just like an emotional mess because she was running around trying to take like make, you know, take care of other people's stuff, trying to like do things for them. And it's just you can't do that. You know, so let me also let me as we're talking about business, you know, let me tell let's talk to the entrepreneurs here just for a second, because, you know, first of all, that's probably you know the most of my my listeners, right? Those are my peeps. Because listen, if you're a business owner listening to this, uh you picked literally the hardest career when it comes to dealing with other people's opinions. I mean that and probably Hollywood stars, so you're in the same category. Because we are out there putting our thoughts, our ideas, our hearts, our faces, our stories online every single day for everyone to comment on. I mean, just think about this podcast, for example, or any podcast. Anybody in the world could listen to this. And anybody in the world can have an opinion about this. And the truth is our brains were not built for this level of exposure. Back in the day, if your neighbor farmer told you your carrot looked weird, you'd feel a little shame and move on. You know, maybe you ask a couple questions, but there probably would be a little bit of like embarrassment or shame, but you'd move on. Now imagine thousands of farmers from all over the world coming at you about your damn carrot. That carrot is way too skinny. Why would you grow it in that that in that color? Right? You don't know anything about farming. You're ruining carrots for everyone, whatever they'd have to say, whatever kind of things they have to say about it. And we're like, why did I choose this career again? We do stupid things, us up entrepreneurs, we do. We choose a career path where the main job description is literally, you know, put out thoughts and let strangers tell you their thoughts about your thoughts and go. And your brain's like, what were you thinking? But listen, if you can build tolerance for that discomfort, which FYI, you can, your business grows, your confidence grows, your income grows, your opportunities grows, your voice grows. That's the part people don't talk about enough. And honestly, this is where identity work becomes so important. We're talking about not, you know, letting go of what people think about us. Right? We're really talking about kind of a switch and change in our identity, which is could be hard full-on work, but also the best work in in the world. Right. Not caring so much about other people's opinions is not about pretending to be confident. It's about something much bigger than that. It's about becoming someone who doesn't need approval to move on and to take actions and to do things and to live their lives. When I work with clients, the first thing that we do is to find who are you becoming? Who do you want to become along the way of creating your goal and your your results and whatever your goal and result is? And just some examples. I'll give you some examples of some of my past clients and maybe my current clients. Some of the identities that they have, you know, wanted to walk into and have become are I'm becoming the woman who's okay with not everyone that I'm not everyone's cup of tea. Or I'm becoming the woman who takes up space and actually loves it. Or I'm becoming the woman who's no longer scared of being visible. And this does not happen in a second. This takes work, but the first piece is knowing and understanding who is the woman I want to become, who is the man I want to become, so I can then start working towards and marching towards this person. Because then we have to get to know her. We have to know how does she think, how does she make decisions, how does she dress, what does she value, how does she speak, who does she hang out with? What does she do for fun? What does she tolerate? What does she no longer tolerate? And we start asking these questions, we start getting to know her like a like a new friend. And we start making little decisions like that woman, and then you slowly become her. And this is why this all matters for so many of us. Caring what people think is just our default identity, our default thinking. We've done it our whole lives. It's literally what we've been taught how to perform to make people happy. I mean, literally the smile, right? When you're a little baby and you smile for the first time and everyone flips out, then the baby learns, like, oh, that's a good thing. Like if I smile, they'll be so happy. They'll make sounds, they'll pick me up, they'll do all the things, let me just do it again and again and again. So it's literally the first identity that we carry. We don't even realize that it's optional to have anything different. But once we see the benefit of not living that way, the relief and the clarity and the freedom, it becomes very hard to go back to that particular identity. Other people's opinions get to be, oh, I don't know, just opinions. They're not facts, they're not evidence, they're not truth, they're not verdicts, they're just thoughts, just like you have thoughts, they have thoughts. And you get to choose how much weight that carries for you. And you always want to choose it of is it benefit me? Does it make me feel motivated, excited, happy, welcomed? If it does, bring it on. And if it doesn't, you get to give it back to that person and walk away. All right, my friends. I think that's it. I think that we did a good job covering this topic between these two different podcast episodes. I'd say we have to listen to it again and again and again because again, this comes up all the time, especially because we are dealing with so many different human beings in the world. But I just want to say thank you so much for being here always. Thank you for listening. Thank you for doing this work with me. It really is my honor. And if you're a small business owner and your business has been confusing lately, overwhelming, or you just want another brain and some grounded support, come and join me next month on my free group coaching call. We have a lot of fun. We really do. I'd love to have you there. So thank you guys so much. Have a beautiful day, a beautiful week, a beautiful life. Love you guys. I'll see you next time.