It’s not about you!

Do you remember that awkward stage of adolescence when you were convinced that everyone was watching/talking about/thinking about and judging you all the time? Do you have the courage to admit you had a little bit of that feeling just yesterday?

For the most part, with each year of gained wisdom we grow up and away from the sense of self absorption that processes everything from a “me” center. However, there are times we struggle with how to let go…whether we’re wrestling with a small dose of hurt feelings over the implications of things said or unsaid; or we’re building the framework for full-blown conspiracy theories in which most of those around us seem bent toward our destruction.

The fact is, people seldom think of you. Sorry to break it to you. But you might be casting yourself as a legend in your own mind—whether it is as a legendary success or the master of mediocrity—all based on information you process at a personal level that was never intended for you to take personally!

Don Miguel Ruiz makes it clear in his book, The Four Agreements. In Chapter Three of his delightfully simple little book, he explains the second of the four agreements: Don’t Take Anything Personally.

“Personal importance, or taking things personally, is the maximum expression of selfishness because we make the assumption that everything is about me…

Nothing other people do is because of you.When you take things personally, then you feel offended, and your reaction is to defend your beliefs and create conflicts. You make something big out of something so little, because you have the need to be right and make everybody else wrong…

I don’t take it personally when people say, ‘Miguel, you are the the best,’ and I also don’t take it personally when they say, ‘Miguel, you are the worst.’…

Either way, it does not affect me because I know what I am. I don’t have the need to be accepted.”

I know what I am. The catch is that it is much easier for a healthy and balanced person to liberate him or herself from the need for acceptance and from the autoresponse to process personally. And the fact is, at some point, we are all unbalanced and all unhealthy and cling to others’ perspectives in order to justify our own…even if we want to feel miserable about our situation.

Awareness is step one. Step two, come up with a new way to frame the information you take in. One of my favorite lines is, It is what it is! Or, What an interesting perspective! Those thoughts trigger space in which I can rationally filter the input and determine what to keep and process and what to let go. After all...just because things aren’t meant to be taken personally doesn’t mean they don’t require personal attention

So…the boss that’s out to get you? Yeah, well, she’s pretty consumed with keeping her own job right now, or maybe one of her family members is an addict, maybe her feet hurt her all the time…you don’t know! So why on earth would you make any part of her life about you?! If you’re so distracted by your assumptions about her behavior that it robs you of productivity at work—or worse, sleep at home, just ask her…clarification, communication and explanation lead to facts, which trump assumptions every time!

And that employee/family member/neighbor you’re sure is constantly thinking of ways to sabotage your progress…nope, not at all. As Ruiz points out, those individuals function in an entirely different reality with history, hopes and dreams that is programmed differently from yours and completely void of any thoughts of you at all. Go figure!

So let’s get over ourselves folks. It’s not about us. It is about a world that needs us. When we clear our internal spaces of all this self-absorbed paranoia and muck, we make great room for goodness to grow. Those are the seeds you should be planting. The seeds of doubt, despair, worry, distrust…they all yield weeds, so don’t let them take root in your spirits.

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