A few months ago, when I was really going through some difficult life things, a friend of mine gave me some great advice:
“Not everyone is going to like you.”
Why? How do they know they’re not going to like me?
Growing up, my father always told me that you can’t dislike someone without knowing them, and that is the way I have lived my life.
You can’t tell by looking at someone what is in their heart, what is in their soul. Without speaking to them, without having an authentic conversation with someone, you don’t know anything about them, can’t learn anything about them, and therefore can’t make an educated decision about whether this person would be a good fit in your life or… whether you like them.
I just read that again. A couple of times. (Funny how writing something down makes you look at it in a new light.) I’ll explain what I figured out in a minute.
He would also tell me that you can’t judge a book by its cover – we’ve all heard that one – but until this moment, I never realized just how much the two pieces of advice go together.
Your outward appearance is your cover. How many times have you read a book based on the cover and found out that the insides were nothing like what you saw (or assumed) from the outside? Looking at someone and judging them on whatever it is you take exception to is judging a person based on the outside, and when you judge that person, deciding immediately you don’t like them because of that, then you never get to see the interior, never get to see what that person holds inside of them. (What’s that saying? “Beauty is but skin deep, ugly lies the bone; beauty dies and fades away, but ugly holds its own.”) Your missing out on true life lessons – and even possible lifelong friendships – because you allow yourself to be and keep yourself blind to who people really are.
So, back to the original two pieces of advice. She’s right – not everyone is going to like me. And he’s right – you can’t like someone without taking the time (and chance) to get to know them. Which makes me realize (epiphany, much?) that their dislike of me, for whatever reason, has nothing to do with me, and everything to do with them. They’ve chosen to dislike someone (and sometimes vocally) that they don’t know anything about, all based on their perceived (mis)conceptions based on (possible) outward appearance or something that is (wrong) in them (i.e. poor confidence, jealousy, etc). Because without knowing the actual person, you can’t make decisions, and when you do, your decision is not based on anything that is wrong with them and everything that is wrong with you.
So it’s not me. It never was. There is nothing wrong with me. Those people that attempted to make me feel less than, who tried to make me feel I needed to change who I was, without actually knowing who I was – they were the problem all along.
I’m going to continue having conversations with people that bring me connections… and going to stop worrying so much about the people that dislike themselves so much that they can’t truly get to know the people around them.
Beautiful Screamer 