Stop Caring What Everyone Thinks

Growth in your career happens when you stop trying to make everyone happy

“What is the company looking for?” My developer wanted to know. “What skills should I lead with or develop?”

In a competitive field it’s natural to want to know how to set ourselves apart, rise to the top, become one of the key players, a leader, someone indispensable to the team and the project.

But is this approach effective?

What happens when we try to adjust our approach to what someone or something outside of us wants?

It can feel like chasing the wind. Trying to predict what someone else wants and become that puts us in a constant state of feeling unsure, uneasy and insecure.

Whose opinion counts?

Sometimes, the more you try to please others, the less you actually do.

One designer on a project kept trying to please the client with their designs. After several failed attempts the client asked the designer: “Do YOU even like this design?” and they answered “no”.

After reflecting on what THEY felt was needed and what kind of work would be up to their standards, they made one last attempt and knocked it out of the park.

That simple questions: “Is this up to YOUR standard? Do YOU even like it?” was just the push they needed to stop chasing approval and start rising to their own level of excellence.

Authenticity wins

When someone is completely themselves, knows who they are and lives in full alignment, it is powerful.

Trying to be something we are not is a surefire way to take up energy we could be using on more productive endeavors.

The question is NOT “What do other people want?” the question is:

“How can I live as fully into my authentic values as possible?”

This is why we’ve spent so much time over the last few months talking about knowing what you want, asking for what you want, living into your values and getting clear on what is important to you.

It’s called Integrity

Someone who knows who they are, lives into their values, and is grounded in their worth, moves different. They speak differently.

One of my favorite quotes says: “A lot of people put motivational quotes up on the wall, and all they do is collect dust. Become what that quote says. Live it every day.” – David Goggins

This is why taking action matters. It is the evidence that creates the foundation to move through the world with confidence. Nothing is more satisfying than laying your head down at night KNOWING that you are who you say you are, and you don’t need to be anything else.

What does this have to do with career growth?

Growth that is guided by your own inner compass, led by your values, and taped into your own unique strength will always be more powerful and effective than trying to fit into someone else’s mold.

I was coaching with a developer who couldn’t figure out how to show up in a meeting with the CTO of the company he was working with. He was trying to figure out what the CTO wanted from him. Guessing and talking in circles, getting more and more anxious by the second.

Finally I asked him: “How do YOU want to show up?”

He paused for a moment and then rattled off the things he knew were most important to the project. He knew he wanted to be confident and lean into the strategy he had built. Those were his strengths and when we pulled IN it was clear how he should proceed.

After the meeting, he reached out to me and let me know the CTO was so impressed and he felt so much more peace when presenting. The magic here is that even IF the CTO didn’t like what he had to say - my developer would STILL have felt personally really great about showing up in the way that was authentic to him.

We cannot please everyone. But when we stop trying to, and instead focus on showing up in integrity with ourselves, we can feel good about the situation regardless of the response from others.

Find your center

It’s great to have mentors and to know the business goals of the company you are working for. But wasting energy trying to be something that someone else values will only create more friction, people pleasing and exhaustion.

Focus your energy inward rather than outward. You will become a person who is aligned, powerful and at peace with themselves.