There is no better feeling than reaching a point in your life where you no longer feel the need to prove yourself to other people.
The fact is, most people aren’t worth impressing. That’s not to say that people don’t matter, but their opinion about who you are and how you live your life just isn’t relevant.
After all, you’re the one living your life! The way you live your life should make you happy, not the rest of the world.
Let’s look at some goals to work toward that people who are unconcerned with others’ judgment often have.
8 little habits of people who no longer feel the need to prove themselves to anyone:
1. They stop arguing to be right.
“Two plus two equals blue!”
Yeah, I don’t care anymore. Have a good time with that.
That’s what you may find yourself thinking when you stop caring about proving yourself. You realize you just don’t have to prove yourself right in every situation.
There’s so much freedom in just letting people be wrong about inconsequential things that don’t matter. Another person thinking two plus two equals blue has exactly zero bearing on my life.
Do not mistake this for passivity. It does not mean a person is passive. What it means is that person has identified that arguing about nonsense just for the sake of being correct is a waste of time and energy.
Unless you know that person well and you know they will be open and receptive to changing their mind, it’s usually not worth the time and energy.
2. They ask for help without seeing it as a weakness.
I suffered unnecessarily for so long in my life because I just wouldn’t ask for help. I had the point of view that I’m a grown man, and I don’t need help to conduct my life. My pride and ego got in the way.
Life isn’t all that complicated, I thought. You work, you pay your bills, and you try to find some fun and happiness in the spaces in between.
I approached life that way for such a long time, and it was damaging. I had a lot of problems and challenges that could have been much easier had I just asked for help.
What I eventually learned is that it is not shameful or weak to ask for help. I don’t need to prove myself by appearing like I know how to solve every problem alone.
I’m only one person on this floating rock of 8+ billion people. It is absolutely unreasonable for me to know how to solve every problem I might face.
Besides, most people love to help someone out. They love to demonstrate their knowledge and see it put into action. Not only that, but asking for help builds trust with the people you’re asking. You’re saying to them, “I trust you to help me find the solution,” and that strengthens the relationship.
3. They can say “I don’t know” without feeling inferior.
A secure person who isn’t interested in impressing others is able to say, “I don’t know” when they don’t know the answer. Again, there should be no shame in that. Yet social conditioning can cause people to think they always need to have an answer, always need to know what to do next.
That’s ridiculous. There are so many things in the world that I don’t know – and that’s awesome! That means that there is more for me to learn and experience, and I can do it with other people.
It takes a lot of humility to say, “I don’t know,” particularly to a group of strangers or coworkers. But I’ve learned that it’s far better to acknowledge when I don’t know something because people tend to respect you when you know your limits.
Plus, it’s a matter of honesty. If you BS your way through an answer, the people who know better will know that you don’t know what you’re talking about. Worse yet, it can come back to bite you later.
4. They stop comparing their lives to others.
There was a time when I used to feel down about my lack of progress in life. I had a lot of mental health issues that really derailed my early adulthood. I was very behind on a number of social milestones because I screwed up a lot.
I got kicked out of college, lost relationships, couldn’t hold a consistent job, and much more. I looked at my peers who were doing much better than me, and it made me feel bad about myself.
Now I understand that it’s unnecessary.
I wasn’t dealt an easy hand to live with. I’m fortunate and grateful that I largely made it through my struggles to where I am today.
Now that my mind and life are more in order, I’m able to pursue some of those things that I wasn’t able to in my 20s because I wasn’t mentally stable.
My path is my own, just like yours is yours. When you stop trying to prove yourself, you realize that there’s no right or wrong way to achieve success and happiness in life, despite what society wants you to believe.
5. They can admit mistakes without defending their decisions.
It takes humility to admit when you make a mistake because it’s often not a good feeling.
Somehow, many of us wind up with social conditioning that tells us admitting a mistake is a weakness. It’s a vulnerability, and an unacceptable one at that.
When you view it that way, you feel like you need to prove yourself, and what you end up doing is admitting mistakes and giving apologies that sound more like you’re making excuses.
“I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, but…”
That’s a non-apology.
I had to correct this behavior in myself. I thought that if I explained myself, that would fix the problem and keep my image intact. Surely, if they could see that I made a bad decision in good faith, that would change their opinion or soothe their anger.
But that’s not the right way to go about it. By doing that, I’m not trying to make amends; I’m trying to control and direct their emotions. Instead, the approach I take now is more like this.
“I’m sorry I hurt your feelings. It wasn’t my intention. How can I fix it?”
Simple as that.
6. They learn to tolerate disappointing people.
Learning to disappoint people is a tough change to make if you happen to be a people-pleaser who doesn’t want to let other people down.
But the reality is you are going to let people down sooner or later if you are doing what’s best for your well-being.
Sometimes, you’re going to have to tell someone “no,” and that will have to be the end of it. They will just have to accept it, find a different approach, and move on.
You need to keep in mind that it’s not your responsibility to carry the rest of the world. It’s not your responsibility to always be at the beck and call of other people. Many people will try to make their lack of planning and time-management skills your problem. It’s not.
The world is not going to end if you start taking care of yourself, and that becomes a lot easier to do once you stop trying to prove your worth to other people.
7. They allow themselves to be disliked or misunderstood.
I had a powerful epiphany about ten years ago that helped free me from the unhelpful cycle of proving my worth.
I realized that it doesn’t matter all that much if you are disliked or misunderstood.
To be disliked can actually be a good thing. It’s often a byproduct of standing up for yourself or something you believe in. Besides, it’s exhausting to be on a treadmill where you constantly need to explain yourself only to still be misunderstood.
I realized that a lot of the people who disliked or misunderstood me didn’t know me, or care to know me. They just knew their impression of me and judged my character from that.
Many of those people just wanted a reason and a target to be angry at. I became that target for whatever reasons they created in their own head, and it had little to do with me as a person.
Once you stop needing everyone to like you, it gets a whole lot easier to be happy in your own skin.
8. They trust their own judgment without applause.
A person who doesn’t feel the need to prove themselves is often self-confident.
They have a strong sense of internal validation. They don’t need other people to tell them that they did a good job to know that they did a good job. They don’t need other people to approve of their choices, because they know they made the best choice that they could with the information they had.
At that point, why does the opinion of anyone else matter?
There’s a problem with seeking external praise. It essentially puts you at the whims of the other person, and they aren’t necessarily thinking about what’s best for you.
Unless they’re aware of their own bias, they’re most likely to be thinking of your problem within the context of, “How will this affect me?”
Learn to trust your own judgment without anyone else’s approval, because you are the one living your life, not them.
Final thoughts…
Learn to let other people down. Not on the important stuff, mind you. Just on the small or inconvenient things.
Reasonable people won’t get upset with you for that. Unreasonable people probably will, and if they do, that’s a good sign that you should examine your relationship with them.
Those who are taking advantage of a people-pleaser often get angry or try to bully their target back into compliance, so watch out for that.
Remember, the only person who can truly look out for you is you.
