Tiny Buddha

Tag: personally

  • If You’re Feeling Judged: One Thing You Need to Understand

    If You’re Feeling Judged: One Thing You Need to Understand

    “Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.” ~Albert Einstein

    Most of us feel judged at times. We might feel judged for the way we look, the things we do (or don’t do), the things we say (and the way we say them), or for the things we believe.

    We might respond to feeling judged by retreating inside ourselves, hiding, and silencing our voice, or we might react in defense or retaliation as if we’re being attacked.

    It doesn’t feel good to feel judged. It can hurt, make us feel like we’re not good enough, and drain our energy.

    But if we want to be free of the heavy burden of feeling judged, there’s something very important we need to understand.

    Feeling judged and being judged are not the same thing!

    This is such an important distinction. And understanding it can make the difference between feeling insecure or stable.

    It’s the difference between hiding and shining.

    Feeling Judged vs. Being Judged

    When we feel judged, it’s something we experience inside ourselves.

    It’s a feeling, not necessarily a fact.

    It’s important to understand that how we feel and react to others is up to us. It’s a result of our conditioning, traumas, fears, emotions, insecurities, attitudes, and the things we believe (whether they’re actually true or not), but it’s ours.

    It may be triggered by what someone says, but the feeling is still ours.

    Being judged is something else. It’s something people outside of us do. Whether someone passes judgment on us through their words, actions, a certain look, or a sneering sound under their breath, it’s an external thing… and we can react to it, or not.

    I’m not suggesting it’s easy to not react or take it personally, but understanding the distinction is important.

    Taking Things Personally

    If someone questions something we’ve said or done or why we believe something, we might take it personally and feel like that person is judging us.

    Have you ever felt judged because someone asked you a question?

    Be honest!

    We might act defensively or angrily when someone questions something we believe, but that person may genuinely want to understand us better.

    If we’re insecure about who we are, or if our sense of self is deeply attached to our beliefs, then any question can feel like an attack or judgment.

    But that doesn’t mean it was a judgment.

    I’m a very curious person. I’ve always been curious to understand myself, my mind and emotions. I know this comes through self-inquiry—meaning to question myself and my beliefs—and sometimes that is uncomfortable.

    But it’s more than just understanding myself, it’s a curiosity to understand the human experience. This also means understanding others. This curiosity to understand is also the desire to connect on a deep, authentic level.

    As Thich Nhat Hanh said: “Understanding is love’s other name. If you don’t understand, you can’t love.”

    Because of who I am and what I do, I often ask people questions about who they are and why they believe what they believe.

    Most of the time I’ve found people are quite open with me; however, occasionally people take my questions personally. Now, I know I had no sense of judgment in my questions, only my curiosity to understand and connect, yet there are times when the people I’m talking to become defensive.

    Even though I understand, when this happens, I can sometimes still feel a sense of being judged. Judged for something I didn’t do. But this is my reaction. I perceive their reaction as a judgment for my perceived judgment.

    I know, it sounds a little complicated, but that’s what happens sometimes. If I catch myself and feel what’s happening inside, I’m able to move through it and let it go.

    But it starts with recognizing and being mindful of my reaction.

    We Have a Choice

    In times when we feel judged, we can react, defend, and justify our emotions by trying to blame someone else, or we can use it as an opportunity to be curious about ourselves—to understand so we can learn and grow.

    Choosing to grow does not mean we don’t feel our emotions. We do. We feel them, and it can be uncomfortable at times. But choosing to grow means we feel our emotions consciously and recognize our reactions so we can take responsibility for them. Because we understand our emotions and reactions are ours.

    As long as we try to blame others for how we feel, we will always be the victim, because it will feel like we don’t have a choice.

    By learning to own our emotions by being present with them, we have the power to transform our relationship to them. We can then learn to navigate the landscapes of our mind.

    Let Go by Being Curious

    If you’re feeling judged—assuming someone is thinking badly of you and feeling bad about yourself in response—engage your curiosity.

    Follow your emotions mindfully. Just feel them. Be present with them (to the degree that you are able). Let them take you deeper into yourself.

    Ask yourself:

    Why do I feel judged?

    What beliefs am I holding onto?

    What do I not want to see about myself?

    What do I not want to admit?

    Am I judging myself? If so, for what?

    Why does it matter what someone else thinks?

    Don’t underestimate the power of our curiosity. It’s a superpower!

    It really can shift us from a closed and reactive state of mind into an open and receptive state of mind. Open and receptive is the place where we can break our self-imposed limits, connect to our heart, and grow.

    It’s also the place where understanding becomes love. Both within ourselves and within our relationships and interactions. It’s the place where we can heal our collective separation and bring back a sense of unity.

    Curiosity is the magic that can facilitate it.

    Journaling is a great assistant to curiosity. It helps us connect more deeply to what’s happening inside us. Any time you feel judged, take some time to sit quietly and reflect on your emotions, thoughts, and feelings. Writing them down can help to make it more tangible.

    Do this enough and you’ll start to see familiar patterns emerging.

    Find Your Strength

    It’s likely that people will judge you at some point. But remember, that doesn’t mean you have to take it personally or feel bad about yourself.

    Whenever you’re feeling judged, whether someone else is judging you or not, remember, it’s just a feeling. Use these times as opportunities to deconstruct your limits and insecurities.

    By doing this you connect with your true self and allow the strength of your heart to emerge.

    And the world needs your heart to shine!

  • Hurt by Negative People? How to Stop Taking Things Personally

    Hurt by Negative People? How to Stop Taking Things Personally

    “Some people are in such utter darkness that they will burn you just to see a light. Try not to take it personally.” ~Kamand Kojouri

    The saying goes that money makes the world go round, but of course that’s not true.

    It’s our relationships.

    How we relate to other people and how they relate to us keeps our world turning. When things go well, all’s right with our world. When things go badly, it can feel as though our world has ground to a halt.

    This is exactly how I felt whenever I had a difficult experience with a loved one or friend.

    Whenever they lashed out at me for no real reason, it felt as if I couldn’t move on again until their negativity or bad temper had blown over. Until that happened, I replayed the scenarios in my mind, trying to work out where I was to blame for their behavior, and feeling awful in the meantime.

    That’s why our relationships will always be the most important thing in our lives—they have such a strong impact on us, both good and bad.

    That is also why it serves us well to try to have the best possible relationship with others, as well as ourselves. That includes improving the connections we have with the difficult and less-than-positive people in our lives and strengthening our boundaries in the process.

    We probably all have several negative people in our lives—those who criticize, complain, belittle us and other people, and say or do cruel things. They can be the closest to us, people we have known all our lives, and that makes their negativity harder to escape and endure.

    I had a family member who was very negative about pretty much everything. Spending time in their company was usually a draining and disheartening experience due to their complaining and sniping comments.

    This person made it very clear whenever I met them that they had little time or affection for me, which of course made family get-togethers less than enjoyable.

    I was also puzzled as to why they were like that: we’d never argued, and I had never, to my knowledge, done or said anything mean to them. Yet, they still acted in a negative way toward me, especially if I mentioned affirmative life experiences such as a great holiday or a new exciting project.

    Unsurprisingly, I responded to their negativity with a sense of apprehension, frustration, and confusion, which stopped me from enjoying the company of my other relatives. It also made me wary about fully expressing myself or talking about my life. And my uneasiness undoubtedly made the atmosphere between my family member and me even more negative.

    We all Have Emotional Scars from the Past

    I eventually recognized that I was hurt by my relative’s treatment in large part because I took it personally and allowed it to affect my self-image and self-esteem—as if I somehow deserved it. Then I realized something that changed everything for me.

    We all have a self-image shaped in large part by other people. Family, friends, and partners, who’ve likely scarred us through anger, resentment, jealousy, judgment, neglect, or even outright abuse. And this affects how we show up in the world.

    Everyone, including the people who have wronged you or been negative toward you in some way, has scars from their past too.

    Maybe your critical mother doesn’t know any better because her mother was critical. Maybe your absent father never knew his father either. Maybe your backstabbing friend was jealous of you for reasons only known to them. Perhaps your cheating partner had abusive parents, and your partner sabotages relationships because they don’t believe anyone can love them.

    Each and every one of us carries around our scars, going out into the world to meet other people who have scars, and when we connect, these combined scars can sometimes tear open.

    We all See Ourselves Through Others’ Eyes

    We all tend to see ourselves through our loved ones’ eyes—starting with our parents when we’re young—because we assume their perceptions of us are accurate and blame ourselves if they’re not flattering. Our self-image can alter based on their comments, emotions, and actions—positive and negative.

    This is a classic case of our relationships shaping our sense of self, an ongoing shaping that begins even before we can fully understand the meanings of what other people say or do to us.

    We are each the result of our experiences within our multiple relationships and interactions. How other people relate to us affects our image of ourselves, but that doesn’t mean we are helpless in the face of other people’s behavior toward us.

    We may not have had much of a choice as a child, but it’s a different matter once we’re adults. With awareness, we’re now able to protect ourselves far better from others’ negativity toward us and set necessary boundaries.

    Learning to Connect in a Different Way

    If you’re dealing with a negative or painful relationship that leaves you feeling bad about yourself, you can of course choose to distance yourself from the person and limit contact. Sometimes, however, this isn’t possible, so you have to learn how to connect in a different way while safeguarding yourself from their negative impact on you.

    I decided I had to respond differently to my family member and their negativity for the sake of my well-being. I began to look beyond their behavior and actions, and in doing so I started to piece together an idea of what might be the real cause of their pain and unhappiness.

    I recalled they had often moaned about how much they hated their job, how they disliked the town they lived in and their neighbors, and they also often complained of tiredness and physical aches and pains.

    I began to see that this person’s negativity—even if it was aimed at me, maybe due to their feelings of envy—wasn’t really about me. They were unhappy with their life in general. Negative people are often unhappy on many levels.

    It also helped me to remember we all have emotional scars, as mentioned before. When you approach people from a place of understanding, compassion, and empathy, you no longer see them as cheats, liars, betrayers, or “bad” people out to get you—even though they might cheat, lie, or betray you. You instead begin to see beyond their behavior and recognize that they’re in pain.

    When you do that a lot of their power over you starts to fade. You begin to see them as vulnerable, like everyone else. You start to realize that their negative actions toward you reflect far more on them than they do on you.

    People often hurt each other because of their own deep pain and because they don’t know any other way to act. This is often a painful lesson to learn.

    But when you finally grasp this difficult truth, you become more accepting of what happened, more forgiving, and ready to let go and move on. You realize you do not need to take on their negativity, brood about it, or feel you are the cause of it.

    That doesn’t mean you have to condone or accept mistreatment. And that’s not to say people’s negativity toward you won’t bother or hurt you ever again, but the effect won’t be so intense. You’ll realize that the situation isn’t really about you at all. Any pain they try to inflict on you is simply a reflection of what they feel inside; it no longer feels so personal.

    When I stopped taking my relative’s negativity personally, I was able to interact with them in a different way. I was much more relaxed in their company and able to enjoy family gatherings much more.

    When you stop taking other people’s negativity personally, you cease to be so susceptible to creating your self-image through their eyes. In fact, you start to focus far more on how you view them.

    Then you’re also free to focus less on their negativity and bad behavior and more on how you respond to it. That might mean setting boundaries and limiting your contact with them, and that’s okay. Sometimes you have to understand and empathize from afar to take good care of yourself.

    We’re All in the Same “Life” Boat

    Essentially, we’re all in the same “life” boat, bobbing up and down on the vast ocean of existence.

    We are all fallible. We all inflict hurt on others, intentionally and unintentionally.

    We all experience negative situations and inevitable suffering, and we simply have to accept this. Without pain and suffering we might not value joy or experience spiritual growth. If we never experienced adversity, we might not appreciate our strength.

    And without negative people we might not be truly grateful for or cherish the loving, supportive people we have in our lives.

  • Avoid Feeling Bad: How to Stop Taking Things Personally

    Avoid Feeling Bad: How to Stop Taking Things Personally

    “There is a huge amount of freedom that comes when you take nothing personally.” ~Don Miguel Ruiz

    Oh man, if I had a dollar for every time I took something personally…

    I’d be rich by now.

    When I quit my corporate job in Paris and took a year off traveling people would often ask me, “So, what’s your plan now?” A normal question to ask, I know. But back then, I usually got offended by that question and other follow-up ones. It made me think that others were judging my decision and questioning my ability to change career paths.

    Or when I was single and people would ask, “So, are you seeing anyone right now?” Again, I’d often assume that they thought less of me if I didn’t have an interesting single life or wasn’t dating someone special.

    Or in the early days of dating my boyfriend, when he wouldn’t have time to talk or see me at times, I’d take it personally and assume the worst. Maybe I had done something to mess everything up. Maybe he didn’t think I was that interesting after all.

    Taking things personally is emotionally draining. It often makes you assume the worst and puts you into the victim corner. Sometimes, of course, it’s worth reflecting on our own behavior, which can help us develop and grow as individuals. But taking things personally, when many times they’re not, just tears down our self-esteem and makes us question ourselves.

    Here are a few ways to stop taking things personally:

    1. Question your negative beliefs.

    When we take things personally, it’s often because we hold a negative belief that is fueling our perception of a situation. For example, if you say “hello” to an acquaintance on the street and get upset because they don’t reply back, you might believe that people who don’t acknowledge you are rude or that they have something against you.

    Look at the limiting belief behind the situation and question it. Maybe they didn’t actually see you. Maybe they didn’t have time to perceive that it was you who passed by. Or maybe they were simply too occupied in their own mind to engage with anyone else.

    Many times, our beliefs make us misinterpret situations negatively and turn them against ourselves. We form negative assumptions and inevitably feel hurt if we don’t take the time to question our thoughts and beliefs.

    2. Don’t assume you know everything.

    When I left my job to travel for a year and get clear on what business to start, I was scared of what others, especially colleagues I respected, would think of me. I simply assumed that they would think I was irresponsible for leaving a good career for… well, I didn’t know yet.

    There was one colleague in particular, who I really looked up to, that I already had assumed judged me for my decision. Whenever she mentioned something about her career, I turned that against myself as a way of confirming “I knew it, she thinks I’ve made a terrible mistake.”

    Then one day, when we were talking about my journey and the choices I had made, she said, “You know Maria, I think you’re so brave. I wish I had the courage to also quit and pursue my own business.” This proved to me that we don’t know what others are thinking about us, even if we think we do. So don’t assume you know everything.

    3. Know that it’s not about you.

    When someone seems harsh or insensitive it’s easy to assume it’s personal. But often, it’s really not. Someone who’s rude to you in traffic might have had a terrible morning. Someone who makes a condescending comment might struggle with their own self-esteem and self-confidence. Someone who’s cold and short in their communication might be really stressed.

    It’s worth reflecting on what we can learn when it comes to things we take personally. In my experience, there’s always a lesson. Try to extract it and then leave the rest.

    For example, when I started a podcast, a friend sent me a picture over Instagram with the message “Women doing podcasts just found a substitute for therapy.” It was supposed to be funny, but it wasn’t to me.

    My learning in that situation was to care more about what I wanted to do instead of one other person’s opinion (or joke). (And I’m happy I’ve continued because, since then, we’ve received so much positive feedback on the podcast!)

    4. Create a counter-story.

    Often, when we take something personally, it’s because it confirms a negative story we have running in the back of our mind. For example, if someone in your family makes a joke or comment about you being messy or having limited cooking skills—and you regularly tell yourself that you’re somehow inferior to others because of these things—you might get offended.

    So, what should you do? Create an empowering counter story. Maybe you’re a bit messy, but so what? You might also be really creative. And maybe you’re not so great at cooking, but you have other skills—for example, you’re the one who always sorts out conflicts between people.

    In short, tell a story that benefits you and remember that we all have flaws, quirks, imperfections, and weaknesses. Needless to say, if you don’t like your behavior, then of course, you have the power to change it. But sometimes you simply need to accept that you are who you are, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

    5. Accept that we’re all different (and not everyone needs to like you).

    You might be taking something personally because this gives you a greater chance of getting someone’s approval. If it’s about you, then there’s something you can do about it. If it’s about them, then it’s truly out of your hands, and all you can do is accept that, for whatever reason, they don’t like you or won’t let you in.

    No single person on this planet is liked by everyone. That’s just part of life, for all of us. Instead of trying to change yourself to be liked by someone, shift your focus and ask yourself why you need this person’s approval. Is it that you’re uncomfortable with disapproval in general, or do you want them to like you for other reasons, such as they are a friend of a friend?

    When you identify the root cause of your discomfort with their disapproval, you’ll be able to tell yourself what you need to hear to let it go—for example, that their opinion doesn’t mean anything about you as a person.

    6. Create space between an “offense” and your reaction.

    When we take something personally, it’s easy to lash out in anger, frustration, or pain, which only makes things worse. Before you step into action, try creating some space between the situation and your reaction. Breathe, step away, and allow yourself to calm down before acting out.

    Maybe you interpreted the situation in a negative way. Maybe this person wasn’t judging or being condescending toward you. Maybe there’s something you don’t know about the situation. Try not to react to the situation, but to respond once you have calmed down. Perhaps with a little time and space you’ll recognize your initial conclusions were wrong.

    7. Ask for clarification.

    If you know the person who said or did something that made you feel bad, ask for clarification. What did he or she really mean? What was his or her intention? Many times, we interpret situations negatively. But in my experience, after asking for clarification, we realize the other person didn’t intend to hurt us.

    So instead of letting your thoughts spin off in a negative direction, ask the person to spell out what he or she really meant. You may be surprised by the number of times you learn that you completely misread a situation.

    8. Practice self-compassion.

    This is what it all comes down to, isn’t it? Practicing self-compassion when we’re being hard on ourselves. Because even though someone else might say or do something to offend us, we’re the ones who decide how we let their behavior affect us. We can always choose not to take negative comments to heart or get down on ourselves just because someone else was rude or insensitive.

    Practice saying, “I’m not letting that in” to draw a clear line when you’ve decided not to take something personally.

    Whether you misinterpreted a situation or someone actually was rude to you, you decide whether to invite it in or not. So stand guard to the door of your mind. Keep a high standard and make sure to let in words, thoughts, and beliefs that empower and strengthen you.

  • Try Not to Take Things Personally

    Try Not to Take Things Personally

    Try not to take things personally

    Source: Inspower