People pleasers, I can see you cowering in my mind's eye. I am one of you, and the road to rehabilitation from this societally-enforced disease is a long one. We don't want to create enemies, we don't want to argue or experience unnecessary confrontation. While at the same time we all have a message and opinion that deserves to be heard.
Do a mental scan of all the passive-aggressive people you know. It's rare to be a fearless straight talker. Cowering behind a veil of neither here nor there is safe. It creates a comfortable distance between our wounds and the wounds of others. But is it going to help us to unite with our inner voice that is dying to be heard? Um, no.
There was a time when I would write a rebuttal to someones article or post, and then delete it. For some reason I didn't value my own opinion enough to go through with expressing this. It's a practice to follow through and prioritize self expression. Even if you're wrong about something. How will you ever know until you start a conversation?
In life and in business not everyone is going to like us. That doesn't make us enemies, it doesn't necessitate undue stress or hardship, it just is what it is. But damn, it can be so hard to see it this way. When we're trying our best to connect with people and show our value and it just gets stomped on, ouch.
Recently my dear papa lost a client who just out of the blue after 25 years decided she didn't like him anymore. Maybe she was offended at his personal evolution and didn't feel they were on the same wave length anymore. Maybe it was more to do with her personal experiences than him at all. But he took it hard nonetheless, because he'd invested a lot of time and energy into doing his best for this lady. Only to be shot down.
I told him that turning people off was a good thing. That by releasing the people that don't totally jive with us, we make space for people that do. This can be hard to accept because initially there is an empty space that often fills with hurt and discouragement. When we just allow that space to exist, something better will naturally come along.
It's not always easy to throw caution to the wind and say what you want to say. Some will love you. While others might be offended or feel like your opinion is an attack on them. The reality is that you aren't responsible for how people react to your truth. It has everything to do with them and nothing to do with you. We've all read or listened to something that we can't agree with, but the action we take is up to us. Say what you need to and express your truth. It doesn't mean your opinion or feelings on a topic are written in stone, instead it opens the doorway for growth.
Human beings are pretty complex. There's rarely such a thing as neutral territory. And if there were, how boring would that be. Here let me write a post on how great it is to breathe oxygen, that way no one can disagree, but no one's going to read that.
No matter which direction you venture towards, know that there will be opposition and there will also be raving fans. There will be trolls and there will be stalkers. There will be people who share your work with the world and people who could care less. Most importantly though, and one of my favorite quotes is this: "You wouldn't worry so much about what others think of you if you realized how seldom they do." -- Eleanor Roosevelt