“You are not what you think you are, neither what other people think you are. But you are what you think other people think you are.”
I heard this quote the other day and it really made me think. Now my question for you guys is, which is more powerful? The version we think of ourselves as, or what we think other people see us as?
Of course it would be ideal to not care about other people’s opinions of ourselves, but that’s contrary to human nature. We evolved to seek approval from our tribe, so it’s natural to care about what other people think.
Unfortunately, our “tribe” and whom we seek approval from has exponentially increased in the past decade. With social media, it can seem like we’re seeking approval from hundreds, if not thousands, of people.
So which is actually more powerful and influential? How we view ourselves or how others view us?
The mind is a powerful thing, but can we overcome what we evolved it to be?
Poems & Prose 
I have been pondering this Question of the Week: Both perspectives are powerful, but we may not be able to determine which is the most. This reminds me of Johari’s Window – especially the things we see in ourselves that others don’t perceive, but also things others see in us that we cannot perceive ourselves.
In the end, these two forces may intertwine – leading us to climb in new directions by choice but not totally from within – the interaction of internal and external ideas shaping our journey.
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I think that’s a great point. There’s many different aspects of these forces. We can perceive some of what others see in us, but we’re still missing the full picture. We also may think others see something in us but they don’t, and they see things we think they don’t see. It’s just a huge, inter-related clustering of opinions and thoughts that aren’t reality, but end up shaping our thoughts and actions which become reality. It’s very interesting to me how all of this psychology plays into marketing and business. So many different places to dive deeper!
In the end I definitely agree that it’s an ebb and flow of internal & external ideas that shape our journey. Like an imbalanced scale that somehow ends up balancing itself out from time to time. At least that’s the best metaphor I could come up with at midnight 😉
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