Lifestyle

16 Truths You Learn After Realizing You Don't Have To Please Everyone

by Paul Hudson
Stocksy

I get a lot of positive feedback for my writing from readers, which is an amazing thing and I’m happy that so many of you enjoy reading my thoughts. Yet, at the very same time I always get a regular stream of haters.

Sure, I get a lot more love than hate, but it’s still interesting to see how people's opinions can differ so greatly. One person can love an article while another will loathe it.

I’ve learned a lot of things writing for Elite Daily in the last few years and I wanted to share with you some of the truths I’ve come to accept. The most important one, though, has been the realization that you can't please everyone.

1. It’s literally impossible to keep everyone pleased.

You can’t do it. You can try -- and fail miserably -- but you will never succeed. Some people simply can’t be pleased no matter what you do.

They won’t be pleased because they either just don’t like you or they just don’t like your work. They may not even have a specific reason they can pinpoint. Most people aren’t very logical.

2. Everybody and their mother has an opinion.

Even worse, most people will be sure to give you theirs even when you don’t want it. You never really have to ask to get another person’s input on any subject.

Sure, there are those who keep a bit more reserved, but many will be happy to add their two cents. This can be helpful, except that usually people's two cents aren’t worth two cents.

3. Opinions are just that -- opinions.

People seem to always forget that opinions aren’t facts. Just because you think something should be done some way doesn’t mean it’s the best way to do it.

It doesn’t mean it’s the only way and it sure as hell doesn’t mean that it’s right. Opinions are neither wrong nor right; they just are.

4. If it doesn’t make you happy, then it isn’t worth doing.

Pleasing other people, at the very least, should please you simultaneously. If you find that pleasing other people is making you miserable, you clearly shouldn’t be trying to please them.

Life is too short to allow yourself to be miserable, especially when there are much better options.

5. More people will kick you on the way up than will when you’re already down.

Most people veer away from poking at you when you hit rock bottom because it's heartless. Sure, there are still those who will, but it isn’t nearly as large a number as those who will kick you when they see that things are starting to go your way.

You’ll often get accused of cheating or rigging the system in your favor. People are idiots -- just because they can’t make it, they assume you must be doing something unethical.

6. Most people won’t help or support you… so why do you care if they’re pleased or not?

It’s amazing because you’d think after trying to please a person so much that they’d at least offer you a hand when you need help. But that’s not going to happen.

Those you please because they make you feel like they need pleasing already think they're better than you are. They feel that they deserve you doing everything to please them. When, in reality, they couldn’t care less about you.

7. We all live in our own reality and want to be the star of our show.

I see the world only through my eyes, as you only see it through yours.

We may not all think that life revolves around us, but we all like to be the protagonist of our story -- and as the protagonist, we want attention. By trying to please everyone though, you’re only feeding their egos.

8. Life has a lot more to offer when you play by your own rules.

The greatest, most successful, most powerful and influential individuals who have ever walked the earth lived in realities of their own creation.

They not only played by their own rules, they made the rest of the world play by theirs as well.

If you believe that you’re right strongly enough, you’ll be surprised how many people you can convince the same. Most call these people visionaries -- people whose vision of reality was so strong that other people started to see the world in the same manner.

9. Just because you shouldn’t please everyone doesn’t mean you shouldn’t bother to please anyone.

You should care about pleasing those closest to you, and really, only them. Why? Because they matter to you. In a sense, they're a part of you.

By pleasing them, you are also pleasing yourself; it’s a win-win situation.

10. When you aren’t worried about what everyone else thinks, it’s a lot easier to focus on the things that actually matter.

We all have a limit to how much information -- or how many thoughts -- we can process on a day-to-day basis. We're limited by the capabilities of our minds as well as time itself.

You only have so much time to think about the things that matter, and since there are so many things in the world that do matter, don’t you think it's foolish to spend time contemplating over trivialities?

11. People like to hate; it’s just a favorite human pastime.

It’s not even a new fad -- it’s been around since the beginning of man. Socrates himself died because of haters; he refused to give into their stupidity and illogical beliefs and he was killed for it.

You don’t need to die for your beliefs -- even I think that was a bit silly of Socrates -- but you can understand that you will always have haters.

No matter what you do, there will always be at least one person hating on you. The more successful you become, the more haters will try to ruin your day. Stop caring about them. It’s actually really easy once you rationalize it all.

12. It’s a lot easier to succeed when you don’t give a sh*t what other people think. Just do what you do because it seems to be working.

Don’t bother to listen to every schmuck with an opinion. Sure, you can sometimes learn something from criticism, but haters don’t criticize -- they insult. On the other hand, constructive criticism should always be welcomed.

Success always means one thing: being able to sell something to a lot of people. Doesn’t matter if it’s a product, a service, an idea or a belief.

You are only considered successful when people are buying whatever it is you’re selling. With that said, you can often learn a lot from your customers.

13. Most people like to talk about things as if they know what they’re talking about, when, in fact, they are clueless.

We like to appear knowledgeable even when we aren’t. Only the strongest are capable of admitting when they are wrong or when they simply don’t know. Most people, however, are weak.

14. Most people simply don’t matter.

Not that they don’t matter objectively, because all human beings do, but they don’t matter to the one person they need to matter to: you. Most of the people who come into your life actually leave you better off by leaving your life.

Those who don’t have anything positive to add are only taking up valuable space. You can fill your life with wonderful people who do matter to you. Unfortunately, they’re rare creatures.

15. Your life is better when you remove the poisonous individuals.

It’s sad, but many of the people we keep about us are harming us -- often without us even realizing it. Many of us have “friends” who are distracting us from our goals, who are bad influences, who make us angry or stressed, who lie to us and abuse our friendship.

Even those who are smart enough to keep their close circle filled with great people will often have poisonous acquaintances. You want to remove yourself from their presence as soon as you can.

16. Those who truly love you and care about you will always be pleased when you’re simply being yourself.

They love you for being you. They don’t want you to please them all the time because they know that would require you to be someone you’re really not.

It’s those who want you to constantly change and constantly adhere to their rules, who don’t know how to appreciate you for the wonderful person you are.

For More Of His Thoughts And Ramblings, Follow Paul Hudson On Twitter And Facebook.