What Important Is Left Unsaid When You’re Worrying What Others Think

What important is left unsaid when you’re worrying what others think?

When you don’t speak up in a meeting because someone might think it’s a stupid idea.

When you don’t say ‘no’ to something, even though you know it’s not a good use of your time.

When you don’t set boundaries with your boss and you’re responding to emails when hanging out with your family at night.

Often when I’m working with clients who want to slow down or speak up, common themes that come up are “I can’t say anything” and “everyone else is putting in long hours and I have no choice”.

I will dig deeper and ask “so what’s really keeping you from what you want?”

99% of the time it comes back to worry about what people will think . . .

They might think I am not a team player. That I can’t handle the demands. That I am not good enough. I am weak because I don’t want to put in more hours . . . all of this comes up.

When you fall into this loop, you’ll continue to struggle with feeling overwhelmed, frustrated and always working because you’re letting other peoples’ expectations keep constantly pounding you.

This has been a HUGE struggle for me my entire life and I’ve made HUGE progress on the past few years.

When I made the decision to stop cold turkey working evenings and weekends (in the most demanding time in my corporate career) the biggest fear that came up was “What will people think of me?”

I had to tell myself going into every meeting, when I had not spent my usual extra hours making everything perfect (didn’t have time for that) or when I chose to not take my laptop home and had to say no to someone….

”It doesn’t matter what they think of me”. I had to remind myself of this over and over to have the courage to do what I wanted to do.

Now this doesn’t mean I didn’t care . . . I still cared about showing up and giving my best and doing a great job . . . it was that their opinion didn’t define me.

“Never allow yourself to be defined by someone else’s opinion of you.” - Unknown

And I had to care more about what I wanted in my life and whose opinions matter most (and not give more weight to others).

To be the parent I wanted to be for my kids by being present in the evening or on vacation or not checking my phone when I'm spending quality time with others.

Or to be the leader I wanted to be for my team by not having them feel overworked and sacrifice their personal time.

The part people often miss is that your worries about what other people will think of you or what might happen IS what gets in the way of you performing at your best.

Because you hold back. You don't say what needs to be said. You don't ask for what you need. Or you do speak up and then you waste your energy with all the worry afterward.

Here are three ways to keep this perspective:

1) Give yourself permission to let go of worry what others think

Give your best every day AND don’t hold back because of what someone might think. What is something you have been holding back because of fear of being judged by someone? What’s being unsaid?

Give yourself a mantra or reframe your thoughts to a more optimistic outlook to overcome the worry, and put your energy into taking purposeful action instead.

Besides, worry is a waste of your mental energy.

2) Let go of judgements

People judge. It is human nature. You won’t please everyone and people will judge you regardless of what you do. Once you are aware of this and accept it, it gets easier to take action.

Also remember: when you judge others, you are giving them permission to judge you (we are a mirror). So, by letting go of your own judgements of other people and even yourself, other people’s judgements won’t affect you so much.

3) Be aware that your self-worth is not tied up in what other people think of you

Our ego can cause us to use other people as a benchmark for determining our own value as a person. Just being aware of your ego lessens it and easier to not give it so much weight.

Work from your inside world – use your values, strengths and character as an internal compass to guide you in your decisions rather than letting the outside world – what everyone else thinks – dictate how you think and actions you take.

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Finally, consider how operating from this fear and worry can be the #1 thing affecting your performance. If you let go of the worry, what would you do differently? How would you show up then?

You’ll instantly gain confidence when you can let go of what others think.

I can tell you from my own experience, science and research, and working with clients, you’ll shine even more when you do.

All my best, 

What Next?

You can sign up for Stacey's masterclass, The Confident "No" here.

Stacey L. Olson is a Leadership and Certified Positive Psychology Coach, has 15 years of corporate experience and has gone through her own transformational change from burning out to balanced in life while performing at a high level (both in her corporate career and own business). She works with professionals who want to work less, live more and be their best even with all the demands, high expectations and messiness of everyday life. Stacey is the founder of The Balanced Leader™ program and offers executive and leadership coaching, workshops, and speaking.