2022-12-15 Give up this misguide

The roman emperor Marcus Aurelius has a quote about the way you should view the opinions of other people:

You want praise from people who kick themselves every fifteen minutes, the approval of people who despise themselves. (Is it a sign of self-respect to regret nearly everything you do?)

Instead of just interpreting it as ‘don’t care what other people think’ take it a step further and understand that everyone around you is probably just as insecure as you are at times. Use this insight to give up the belief that there’s something uniquely wrong with you for ‘kicking yourself every 15 minutes.’

It’s one thing to beat yourself up, but you add insult to injury when you beat yourself up about beating yourself up because you think it’s not normal. It is. We all do it.

You’ll see this theme throughout the post. The goal isn’t necessarily to rid yourself of negative emotions so you can improve your self-esteem. Rather, you want to focus on ridding yourself of the extra context you add to those negative emotions.