Your Opinion Isn't My Business

“Your opinion of me is none of my business.” –Randy Pausch, “The Last Lecture”

This post really should've been done many months ago, in my series on Boundaries. I suppose that we can each use a refresher in regards to boundaries on a regular basis, so this will serve as that refresher for each of you. If you started reading this blog after I did the series on Boundaries, please go back and read the posts. The concept of boundaries is one that is often overlooked, but is essential for maintaining a healthy life, and more importantly, healthy relationships. There is little chance of having healthy relationships if you cannot maintain boundaries with those people. 


A quick reminder: Boundaries "define what is me and what is not me" (Cloud & Townsend). This means that I need to know "what is me", and therefore what I am responsible for and what I can control in life. This means that I am responsible for my own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. I am not responsible for the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of others, and I cannot try to get others to take responsibility for MY thoughts, feelings, or behaviors. 


How does that, then, apply to the quote above? Why do we try to take on the things another thinks and make them our business, when having healthy boundaries clearly states that those things are outside our realm of control?


How much time, stress, energy, and anger do we invest on making another's opinion our business? Furthermore- how often do we change who we are because another doesn't like something about us? We try to fit in, or become a version of someone else instead of ourselves. It's a shame to lose who we are because we take on the opinions of others. 


Now it's your turn:
What do you try to make your business that is actually none of your business? What's happened when you take someone's opinion of you on as your business?