“I’m going to do it later. I’m actually going to be productive tonight. I don’t care what people think about me.”
I don’t know about you, but ever since high school, those are the lies I've continually told myself. Growing up, I haven’t quite mastered the concept of priorities, or what my priorities should be. Out of all those lies, “I don’t care what others think about me” is the one that I most often tell myself.
It can be quite confusing, growing up and wondering whether you should care about what people think or not. We’re told, “Stick and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me.” That’s a lie, words can suck, and they do hurt. Then we’re also told that we need to always think about what someone might think about our first impression, and that first impressions always matter. We should care about our appearance and keep up with ourselves, because we never know when an opportunity may present itself. So what do we do? Do we care, or not?
Telling myself I don’t care about what people think always has helped me. The more I say it, the more I believe it, I guess. I’ve always done my best to try to not give anyone a reason to say my name, but it still happens. I’ve finally just come to peace with the fact that people are going to talk, it’s human nature. I’m guilty of talking about other people too; gossip really does take over sometimes when you’re a teenager. I let them talk. I came to the not-so-shocking realization this year that drama, gossip, and everything else unfortunate about high school really has NO important effect or impact on you later in life. It’s all just silly little rumors. Let people say what they want, because when you graduate, you will not see majority of those people ever again, and what people said about you or teased you about most likely will not follow you. Eventually, everyone will grow up too.
I care about what people think. I always have and I think I always will. It’s impossible for me to ignore the things they say, but it’s so extremely easy to ignore those people. Being confident in your life decisions will help you understand that their opinions are so irrelevant and that they really have nothing more exciting to be doing with their life than talk about you. Knowing that has started to make me feel better. If you really put that much effort into putting someone down, maybe you should be evaluating your own life choices.
The most important thing is to be confident and have fun. Don’t stop doing the things you love. The truth of the matter is that more people love you and enjoy the things you say and do than don’t. If you take one thing away from this, take that away. The amount of people that love you and care about you will surpass anyone who wants to put you down.
