In Brussels’ Musee des Beaux Arts, hangs a painting titled – Landscape and the Fall of Icarus, commonly thought to be the work of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painter, Pieter Bruegel the Elder. The painting boasts a tranquil scene of peasant life – a farmer tilling the land, a shepherd with his sheep, a calm, placid sea, and a glittering cityscape in the background. But look closely in the left-hand corner and you will see a man drowning. This is Icarus. In Greek mythology, Icarus succeeded in flying with wings made from beeswax by his father, Daedalus. But Icarus flew too close to the sun, which melted his wings, resulting in him falling into the sea and drowning. There is a Flemish proverb that goes — and the farmer continued to plough….,” which highlights the world’s indifference to Icarus’ plight in Bruegel’s painting. The world moves on.
This painting is an excellent metaphor for understanding our current environment. The world in which we care so much about what other people think. A world in which opinions of friends, family and even strangers paralyze us from pursuing our own dreams, when ultimately no one really cares that much. People plough their own land, herd their own goats. Now imagine a world where you didn’t care what people thought and lived your life on your terms. Would you be happier? Would you feel more successful? Would you be more successful?
You can’t be successful if you care what other people think
Leonardo DiCaprio once said, “Every next level of your life, will demand a different you.” He is right. If you want different results, you need to be willing to do things differently. That means doing things other people wouldn’t do but more importantly, not caring what other people think. Do you know the number of people that have become incredibly rich and successful simply because they followed this one principle — they don’t care what other people think. Andrew Yang was an entrepreneur who decided to run for president and built his supporter base off a Gmail campaign. Can you imagine the courage and sheer audacity it takes to run for president, especially if you’re not already a public figure?
This is an extreme example, but it’s applicable to almost everything we do. A friend of mine recently told me she watches a lot of YouTube videos. I was so excited to hear this because we discovered we liked many of the same YouTubers. She then said, “You’re the only one I’ve ever told that to.” When I asked her why that was, she said she was afraid to be judged by her other friends. This made me think — if my beautiful and vibrant friend is afraid to openly acknowledge her interests, how many people are holding dreams and passions close to their chest, afraid to pursue them for fear of judgement?
A desire for approval from others, is the greatest source of our unhappiness. Yet our interests, successes, failures, and perceived failures don’t occupy society the way we think they will. Maybe our closest family and friends notice for a moment, but even they move on. We are the centers of own galaxies, and believe we are the centers of everyone else’s. We live by the narrative of other people.
Other people’s opinions about us are largely a projection of their own feelings
Stefani Germanotta was told by an ex boyfriend that she would never succeed, have a hit, or win a Grammy. Her response was, “Someday when we are not together, you won’t be able to order a cup of coffee at the fucking deli without hearing or seeing me.”
She went on to have countless chart toppers, win 11 Grammys and became the first woman to win a BAFTA, Golden Globe and Academy Award all in one season. This woman is of course, Lady Gaga. Had Gaga internalized her ex-boyfriend’s words, she may never have sang, had the gall to wear dresses made of raw meat and shoes that looked like aliens, and we may have never had the privilege of being entertained by one of the greatest artists of all time.
People’s opinions are almost always a projection of their own feelings and rarely have to do with our abilities. The simple reason for this is that most of us are afraid. We are so afraid to try, put ourselves out there, risk falling flat on our face in front of the world. We end up living our lives to a fraction of our potential. Seeing someone with the bravery to try scares us. We are an inherently negative species. Our negativity protects us. It lets us take the path of least resistance and quit before we try. And we project this negativity on to the ones that won’t quit.
Why do we care so much about what other people think?
Our addiction to caring about what other people think is our greatest survival instinct. It is also our biggest social fallacy. The evolutionary roots of this primal behavior, go back to the plains of Africa when being accepted by a group, meant that you were less likely to be eaten by a predator. Today we are the predators – socially and psychologically; and yet our deep desire to be accepted, loved and even adored by everybody has become the fuel for existential anxiety, driving everything from social media addiction to co-dependence on toxic relationships. It’s hard work to ditch that primal hard-wiring, but it’s the only option we’ve got if we ever want to live the lives we deserve.
We have more power than we think
You’ll often hear successful people say that their minds are incredibly quiet. Their internal dialogue only has one voice — their own. Gary Vaynerchuk, founder and CEO of VaynerMedia touts this as one of his core principles for success. He takes feedback from people, but with context. His belief is that, even the most well-meaning people give feedback with intent. They have an agenda or lack context because no one has more context about your life than you. Most people don’t have perfect context. Even the ones that know you well don’t. You’re the only one with perfect vision into your situation. And so, his advice is to take on other people’s opinions with empathy, but don’t take them to heart.
Have you ever thought about what you would do, if you stopped caring about anyone else’s opinion? Would you quit your job, move to another country, travel the world, learn Spanish, become a yogi in a Nepalese ashram, write a book, make YouTube videos, start a podcast, or any number of things your heart desires? Now imagine that you went ahead and did it. Would you be so much happier, so much more fulfilled and actually put so much more time and energy into your passion than you did your cubicle job, that suddenly lo and behold you’re actually really good at it? You’re fluent in Spanish, you can play the guitar, you’re writing everyday, you’ve started a YouTube channel and have your own podcast. You’re good at it. You’re happy doing it. And it’s the only metric of success you need. You’re successful.
