I speak publicly. And I enjoy it. But I only became very good at it the day I realized that I didn’t have to be liked by everyone. It was an epiphany of the first order. I was leading a seminar – as I had done many times before – when I finally woke up to smell the roses. I was not going to entertain everyone. Not everyone was going to like what I had to say or how I delivered the message. And that was okay.
At that very moment, I became a great presenter. I no longer worried about how I was being received and now just had a great time delivering the message. It’s a huge game changer for the majority of us. We’ve been raised – and maybe more so for women than men – with the idea that being popular… being liked… being part of the crowd was the main objective in life.
In fact, popularity, defined as the quality of being well-liked or common, dominates the social consciousness. Whole generations have been raised with the goal of achieving ‘popular status’. Hit TV shows deify the concept of power and wealth that follows “popularity”. Yet bowing to the god of popularity is what confines us and restricts our ability to develop and grow.
Originally ‘popular’ meant to be well-liked or well-respected. But somehow, over that last few years, popularity has taken on ominous overtones of manipulation and confinement. Breaking the bonds of popularity provides freedom and fulfillment. When you are no longer concerned with “what will others think”, you now have the ability to be yourself and strive for the best in what you want and can be.
It sounds like a lecture often presented to young girls on better personal development, but it is quite something else to internalize and understand what it really means to yourself. On the day that I realized I would not be liked by everyone (and that I didn’t in fact, like everyone myself), I was able to begin making life choices that fulfilled me and not my (sometimes) warped idea of what was expected of me.
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