How to Stop Being Afraid of What Others Might Think of You

Being afraid of what others might think is one of the top fears that get in the way of success.

Read more about it here.

If you’ve been a human for a while, you’ve probably experienced this in some form or another.

In my experience as an executive coach and business coach, I have seen that this is one of the most common obstacles to getting what you really want.

Caring what others think is your brain’s way of keeping you safe. Throughout human history, to be ostracized from society has been life threatening and dangerous. You need other humans to survive, and being ostracized was not an option.

Our brains still see being disliked or rejected as a threat to our survival, so we subconsciously and consciously avoid doing things that would make others have distasteful opinions about us.

But this doesn’t translate well when it comes to taking bold action to achieve your big dreams and goals.

To achieve your dreams and goals, other people are going to have opinions and they may think things about you.

So what do you do?

Your first instinct could be to hide.

Or it could be to people please and do things that never go against the safety of your current image.

But in most cases, your dreams and goals are not going to cause you to be ostracized from society.

The best-case scenario will be the people who love you are going to keep loving you and you will attract more people who love the true you.

And also, the best case scenario is that you are going to repel the people who didn’t like you anyway and this is actually good.

But when there is a nameless, faceless mass of “people who are going to judge you” I have found that the easiest way to calm your scared brain is to name them one by one.

Make a list of all the people you are thinking of when you think “what will people think,” and from there ask yourself the following questions:

1. Do I care if ______ (mystery judgmental person) knows this about me? Why?

2. Am I going to let _________’s opinion of me stop me from creating my dream life? Why?

The more you can practice naming the nameless scary people, the more power you will have over your life and decisions.

To work with me, book a consultation here.