No one cares. Seriously.

Photo by Daniel Mingook Kim on Unsplash

You know the feeling.

With anything you say, do, or post, many eyes stare over your shoulder, judging you into oblivion. Consequently, you start walking on eggshells, praying that people don’t think you’re weird and hoping that they embrace you as one of them.

While this type of thinking originated from the Neanderthal era, where being accepted by your tribe increased your chance of survival, it’s safe to say that we have evolved out of that phase. And yet, that fear of ridicule and need to be accepted by our “tribe” perseveres to this day. It is so profoundly linked in our DNA that it will take years of intentional practice to undo millions of years of human evolution.

One day, as I was walking to work, I noticed a woman standing on the curb, alone, in a starfish-like pose with her arms lifted off her sides at a 45-degree angle and staring in front of her without blinking.

As you can imagine, that sight gave me a slight pause, forcing me to question what she was doing and why she was doing it. But, I quickly moved on and started ruminating on the tasks I had to accomplish at work today as I had quite a busy day.

And that’s when it hit me:

I didn’t care one bit why that woman was acting strange.

Within a few seconds, I completely forgot about her. I was bewildered at how quickly I moved on with my day. I always go out of my way to make sure I don’t do anything out of the ordinary that people would balk at. That day, however, I realized I was not even a blip on people’s radar. There’s a term in psychology that describes this phenomenon: the spotlight effect.

We think that everyone is criticizing our every move, but in reality, they’re too preoccupied with their own lives to even think about us.

When you think about it, that is the most liberating thought there is. Why should we tread carefully and play it safe around people who couldn’t care less about what we do? This idea gives us the freedom to share our ideas freely while being our weird selves. After all, we won’t get ousted from our tribes since they don’t even think about us.

This is much easier said than done, though. To this day, I still hesitate to publish posts like these or make videos I love to make because I can envision people I know cringing at and mocking my work. My impostor syndrome would take the steering wheel, effectively convincing me that I have nothing unique or meaningful to contribute and that it’s better to rest in the confines of my comfort zone, away from the dangers of sharing my thoughts with the world.

As David Foster Wallace put it:

You’ll stop caring what people think about you when you realize how seldom they do.