I have a white tee shirt with my grandson’s one-year old baby picture printed on the front. He’s almost seven now, and I was wearing it today while walking him to school. When I pointed it out to him, he was embarrassed.
“Don’t let anybody see it!” he told me.
Worrying about what other people think starts young, doesn’t it? Is that good or bad? Like so many things in life, the answer probably needs a bit of balance.
If we care at all about other people, then we have to care a bit about what they think. As Donald Trump’s famous aid George Ross has said, “To be successful, you have to be able to relate to people; they have to be satisfied with your personality to be able to do business with you and to build a relationship with mutual trust.”
But we can’t be successful if the opinions of others stifle us, depress us, or prevent us from innovating. Perhaps that is what these people were thinking:
“Follow the path of the unsafe, independent thinker. Expose your ideas to the danger of controversy. Speak your mind and fear less the label of ‘crackpot” than the stigma of conformity.” (Thomas J. Watson, Sr.)
“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those matter don’t mind.” (Dr. Seuss)
Perhaps it all comes down to true wisdom. Knowing when and how to react to what others say. John Maxwell put it like this: “Life is 10% of what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it.” I am just about 63, and have a long way to go in assimilating that. I hope I can do it fast enough to help my grandson learn to balance the inputs around him. To fit the pieces of wisdom together.
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