Episode 19: Intention, Attention, Attitude
2/17/2022
The Marsette Perspective
Episode 14: You can't control everything, especially other people.
Brief summary of episode: A breakdown of how and why people make choices based on what they think other people think and believe about them..
Transcription:
What's up, guys? It's Thursday morning and I feel good today. My wife was home, super sick. If it's real gross, I'll be honest, stomach bug and like and so, you know, well, that sucks because she was sick. And I felt that I did get to spend the entire day with my son instead of working, which was awesome in a lot of ways because I don't often get to do that, just kind of one-on-one.
And so we had a lot of fun and that was really cool. And, you know, we played outside and we did a lot of shoveling and all sorts of random stuff. You know, he's very cute, so he makes it very easy. Obviously, the negatives are that I have plenty to catch up on today, but that's okay.
My therapist tells me I gotta, I gotta enjoy the journey. Otherwise, you know, where am I going, right? And so, what I get out of that is I really need to focus on, you know, the fun, exciting and positive things that happen in the day-to-day. And not simply, just look at the long-term timeline and how I've held on that.
As long as I'm moving forward. You know, I'm doing pretty well just like we always say in the gym, the only way to fail is to not show up right to not not do the work as long as you're moving forward. You're doing well, because the alternatives are doing nothing or worse going backwards.
So I'm just happy that I got that opportunity yesterday and yeah it's really checking in feeling good today, slept really well. So that was good, you know, doing all the little self care things, right? You know, drinking the water, eating the food, you know, feels good to feel good, right?
And I've got an interesting topic that I wanted to kind of think through and kind of talk about today. And I guess we're just jumping right into it and it has to do with how other people view you. And I I do recognize that a lot of the things that I go over on this probably stem from similar things, but I try to break it down a little bit more, a little bit more, just kind of, get it out of my head.
And so the thought is based off of a couple of things that I've read in the last few years and I've just kind of been thinking about it more and more. Because in therapy, we talk a little bit about ego and abstract thinking and motivations as well as, you know, things like impulsiveness and we talk about ADHD and, you know, if you just cover so many things.
And a lot of it comes from, like, your own understanding of yourself, and to apply a little bit of recall to this. When you look at life from the standpoint of, the only way to fail is to not show up, to not move forward, to not do the work, right?
So making a decision is the same as saying no or just choosing not to do it, right? Because the result is very much the same. So, I guess what I'm getting at is breaking down. Why are some people indecisive or why do some people hold themselves back or the case? It's and I I think a lot of it has to do with how we perceive ourselves and how we think other people perceive us.
So I guess, let's bring it down this way. Start with the just statement. I guess you can't control at least entirely how other people view you, or who other people think you are. So what I mean by that, is who you believe yourself to be is completely different than your parents, believe you to make.
It's different from who you're friends with. Believe you to be. It's different from your siblings. Believe you to be your co-workers, people who meet you on the street you know one time and a lot of people might think. Well yeah. And it has to do with how close a person is to you.
You know how? Well, they know you and I would say, yeah, maybe a little bit, but that would mean that understanding a person was almost entirely dilutionary. So the further away you were from then was the only factor that battered and knowing a person has to do with so many more things.
So all of your life's experiences are how you handle them. If every moment of every day needs to be how you view the world, your opinions, but what you think is right and wrong, they basically build who you are, all right? As a large piece of it and that influences how you think, how can you think?
Abstractly about something. If you've never experienced that thing and it's likely very difficult, unless you're a person who seeks out varying perspectives, very experiences, very opinions. And I don't think most people do that, especially in today's social media, and political environment, and napping the case, a person's understanding of you is only in part dilutionary.
It's also based on their experiences of what they think is, right? And how they, or raise their opinions and all those things. And so, what I'm getting at is, they're really isn't any point. There's no reason to be worried about who other people think you are because who you are to them, you will never be that person.
Not fully and it's not up to you to change their mind, you don't have to do that. All you have to do is continue to do what you believe to be, right, and consistent, and real, and true. And if this person thinks you are so far off, then it's on.
Then they're the ones who are going to be surprised, but then that's an experience for them, they will start to then, oh, their perspective might shift, they might learn something, they get to understand something better, all right? It's not up to you to change their mind, just up to you to continue to move forward, to do what you believe to be the right thing to take care of yourself, and the way that is most consistent with your goals and beliefs.
And the reason why I was thinking about this is because I think so many people make decisions or I guess. Yeah, make decisions. You know, they make decisions to do some things or to not do other things or they get paralysis by analysis because of how they think they will be, or are being perceived by another person.
Think that's really interesting. And in some cases, very silly, but in all cases, very interesting. And I think that because of what we were just talking about, you can't do anything about how a person perceives you to be not fully, you know, you can do the right thing and follow the customs and courtesies.
You can follow, you know, kind of rules to engagement if you will conversationally in the workplace. You know, what's the policy of procedure? You can follow those types of things and at least maintain an expectation that like you belong there, you're safe, like, you're the right person to be there, right?
You can do that. But you can't necessarily convince a person of who you are, what you are when you're about because they don't ever know. You know the way that you know you then you'll never know you the way they do. Does that make sense so far? It's just very interesting because it comes back to people making choices or the lack of choices, because of something that they have absolutely no control over today.
End up getting so worked up. They end up getting so annoyed or triggered or by the end. It's any of those things where they just get so worked up and it occupies so much of there, though so much of there, energy, so much of their stress is allocated to this thing that they have absolutely no control over to begin with.
Well, you said I think that's so interesting because logically you have no control. So why is that thought that someone might worry about, or someone might consider deep down the, this kind of goes back to a I didn't record about being a white belt and having beginners mindset. And I think that's where people might kind of fuck this up a little bit, and where it might start to occupy too much of there their brain space.
Mostly because if you allow yourself to be a beginner, right? Like we talked about, you get to make all the mistakes in the world. If you do it, fully knowing that most people aren't going to hold you, holy accountable to those mistakes, right? And what I mean is it's not going to be the end of you.
The expectation is typically very low in Europe, for beginners. So it's very safe to make mistakes. And when you think of it that way, right, you're using that time to master the basics, you've got to be very elite at a little things, a little, thanks being on time, right? Being getting all of your work done.
Not making excuses. Holding your mistakes, learning from your mistakes. Helping other people. You have finished your work.
These are all things that as a beginner. They don't really take any. They don't take any skill, they just take effort. And during that face, you have really excellent opportunities to master those things. And so if you do the white belt phase, right? Then you become a master at being a meter.
You become a master at the little things. You come to master the basics in, those are the things that ultimately you have control over, which are likely the most important thing to the other people around you. So I guess the question is, if you are having a hard time with what other people think about, you think you are in those things, you know, to determine whether or not that's warranted.
I would ask the question. Are you doing the little things properly? Are you doing? What do you say you're gonna do? Are you consistent? Are you on time? Are you thorough right? Are you getting all your work done? Are you making excuses? You know, all these things are really, really important.
When it comes to how a person perceives you at a base level. And if you are doing all those things properly, then everything else is just a culmination of their own experiences, opinions, you know, etc? Right? You only have control over the things that you can control and those things largely are unquestionable when they're done properly.
It's very obvious. When a person is on time. It's very obvious when a person is putting in full effort. It's very obvious when a person owns their mistakes. Excuse me. I just sneezed, huh?
It's really obvious when people do the little basic things. Well and it's really hard to not respect a person who does all those things especially with consistency. So I, you know, I kind of come back to if you can answer all those questions confidently that you effectively moved through the beginner phase, the white belt phase, and you do all of those things.
Well then I would say what the other things that people think about you or think you are, they don't matter at all. The only time that matters, if, it's affecting you and your decisions because again, you can only control yourself. So, if those thoughts, if that sort of issue is affecting your ability to make decisions, well, then it's not about the other people.
It's about you. Why is it so important that other people perceive you or understand you to be exactly who you think you are? Why is that so important? My guess would be that. That's an ego problem or a control problem, which I would probably recommend therapy. But also looking at yourself looking at the picture you know, internally of why those things matter to you.
How is it affecting you? Why is it affecting you that way?
If you don't know, you should probably look at it, she probably finds out because now you're sitting here and you're saying, oh shit. Yeah, that is a problem for me. So now you're aware of it and set out to do nothing about that issue. That's clearly causing you. A problem is a choice.
It's just like what we say all the time, right? You got to choose, there's a problem. You have to identify them. Once you identify that problem, we know about it, right? So if you don't do anything about it, you're opting in the suffering you're choosing the new nothing good way to fail or stay the exact same.
That's what you want. Go for it. That's great. That's not what you want. You're making a choice. You follow what? I'm getting at.
So wrapping this all up into kind of like a pretty bow, I guess. Maybe not like I rant a lot, so maybe it's never pretty. But knowing that and putting that all together, if you have a problem with how other people are perceiving you, or how other people, you know, who they believe you to be my challenge would be, how do you know that?
How do you know what other people are thinking? How do you know what other people are believing?
It's very likely a projection from you. You're very likely choosing for those people or that person because I promise you there is a very, very, very low likelihood that you know what another person is thinking. You might know what they're feeling. I feel the pickup on that. There's no chance.
I won't say no chance. There's very little chance. You know what they're thinking or why they're thinking that
Call them out on that. Is it gonna change their opinion? Right. It's likely just going to lead to discord. So what can you do? You can focus on yourself, you can figure out why that thing bothers you? Why do you care?
If it's bothering you so much, is there something that you know you're doing? You shouldn't be doing it. Is there something that you're not proud of?
Here's the insider tip here guys, if you're thinking that way and you're likely aware of a problem and you're just choosing to do nothing about it.
I'm not quite sure. I mean, this podcast would very well be turning into the mental health podcast. Starting to feel that way, but I thought it was like a business entrepreneurship podcast about where I was ready together, guys. So if you have no idea what we're doing here, but you're into it, know that I feel the exact same.
So, here we go.
But that's the point, right? It keeps circling back to the same concept or similar concept which is controlling. You can control largely. That is just you, if you control yourself, you'd probably be. All right, if you are totally absorbed in how other people perceive you, they believe you should ask yourself those questions.
How do you know what they're thinking? Why do you care? Is there a problem that you're aware of, but you're not doing anything about something you're not proud of, you got to take action at the end of the day. One of the things that we are, we talk about in the gyms has to do with priority and it has to do with the stories that people tell themselves.
Cheryl most people have seen those like memes that are supposed to be like this motivation memes and they largely lack a context and typically just polarize people, but that's fine. So you'll know what I'm talking about if you've seen those, but one of the things we talked about is when people provide us with reasons, as to why they don't hit their goals, why they aren't consistent, you know, whatever the case is, it's not about judging them.
It's not about us deciding what they should do, or what they want. It's always about trying to determine what it is that this person actually wants? What is it that they actually mean? And how can I help them help themselves? It's just being a guide. And so, people will say things, like I have no time to exercise and the refrain is that exercise isn't a priority for you.
Right. Now, a lot of times when people hear that, they'll be like, well, no, it is a priority. It's just difficult for me to get up in the morning because that's when I have all my free time. All right, that's good. We're working on solving this problem. We're identifying things that you are important to control of.
So the problem is that you don't have time. The problem is that mornings are difficult for you and getting up early is not something that you have done. Consistently as a result, your fitness has taken a vaccine. So now we've gotten to the root of this problem or at least, you know, we've started getting to the root of the problem, really good.
Because we've taken it from this person has taken zero ownership and it's completely outside of their control too, okay? There is a more definitive picture there is time. It's just not the most convenient time and it's not my favorite time or whatever the case is. All right, I can make a million scenarios here, but now we started to get into something that's more tangible, something that has to do with being more, in control of yourself and it applies for pretty much everything.
You can only control the things you can control. If you frame things in a way that are outside of your control and that's why you're failing, that's why things aren't going. Well that's why you're struggling, then it's very likely that you will continue to do that because it's very convenient, it's very easy to blame other things, other situations, other people, especially when you want something.
But you quote, unquote can't have it, it helps our ego to put it off as something that we have no control over. And then we stopped thinking about it and that's just the way it is. But that's why it's important to ask those questions and to try to dig down and see what's the actual problem here.
Even if it's a small piece, what piece can I control? One percent difference can be big if it's compounded over the course of a year. Yeah, lead one percent better today doesn't feel that hard doesn't feel that hard each day. At the end of the year. It's got a compound and it's gonna make a substantial difference for a person.
And so I'll probably end with this and say that, if you're struggling with things, as a result of how other people perceive, you understand that you're going to be a different person to every single person you meet for the rest of your life. And there's
It's not depressing or whatever. It's just a fact, you can't control other people that don't work. You're not in control. You're only in control of yourself and sooner that you can start to ask yourself the right questions and accept those things as facts. The sooner you're gonna get so much better sooner.
You're gonna feel so much better. You're gonna feel like you're in control. You're gonna be able to make choices and decisions based on your goals and desires. But you have to understand and like to move forward. If you want to identify you have to choose. Once you do that, it's gonna be so much easier.
That's what I've got for right now, guys. I'm gonna sign off now because I can probably just keep kicking this dead horse but it'll just be ranting and more ranting. It might devolve, it super knows what so we're gonna try to call for now. As always, this is The Marsette Perspective please do me the favor and follow the accounts on Spotify.
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Have a great day guys. Thank you so much.