Happy Beautiful Day to you!
I hope you’re doing well and making noticeable progress on your own personal journey toward whatever it is you’re yearning for.
I’ve been enjoying several personal shifts lately—some of them sarcastically enjoyable, and all of them surprisingly freeing.
The other day, my phone decided I needed to see a social media post from a friend. It was a simple cartoon drawing of a skeleton and a black unicorn having a conversation beneath a rainbow.
The skeleton asked, “What’s the secret to being happy?”
The unicorn replied, “Stop caring what anyone else thinks of you.”
I chuckled at first. Of course letting go of other people’s opinions would help us find happiness. It’s a message most of us have heard before. Yet actually doing it? That’s where it gets challenging. Family members, close friends, even the stranger in the grocery store with the resting cranky face—they all have a way of sneaking into our psyche.
Sometimes a single comment can knock us to our knees. Whether the words were meant to hurt or our minds simply chose to interpret them that way, they can land right in the heart. And forget words—have you ever felt “less than” from just a look?
As I sat with that cartoon, a deeper thought surfaced: What if the real issue isn’t what others think of you… but what you think of yourself?
Bear with me here.
I can’t tell you how many times in the past I’ve seen a look or heard a comment and immediately felt myself shrink. I’d start berating myself: not good enough, too loud, too big, too exuberant, not attractive enough… I’m sure you can fill in the blanks with your own inner monologue.
That inner voice can be brutal. It keeps us tucked away in a smaller, more “acceptable” box.
The question is: Is any of that actually true?
Exactly whom is telling me these stories?
Many of those harsh beliefs started as something I heard from someone else—parents, kids at school, church, or society trying to mold me into the “right” shape. But are they true? No, they’re not.
Yet I took those external voices and made them my own, creating a nasty negative feedback loop. All the while, I told myself it was others being mean to me. It’s easier to blame someone else’s judgment than to admit I had become my own harshest critic.
Once I finally owned that I was causing much of my own inner turmoil, everything changed. Awareness gave me the power to choose differently. I could pause and ask, “Is this my voice? Do I actually believe this?” If the answer was no, I could offer myself a little love, kindness, and—let’s be honest—forgiveness for treating myself so harshly.
I had always been taught to extend compassion and understanding to others. It wasn’t until I stepped into a more spiritual, connected space that I realized I needed to give that same compassion to myself.
For a long time, those “be kinder to yourself” messages sounded like empty platitudes. I was a master at avoiding the lesson while clinging tightly to those old negative beliefs.
I’m happy to say that’s no longer the case.
Did you catch that? I’m happy.
I now understand that every single person is walking around with their own inner world. If I have resting cranky face, it probably has nothing to do with you and everything to do with whatever is happening in my head. The same goes for everyone else.
When someone is short or cranky, I can choose to believe it’s aimed at me and spiral… or I can choose to see that they’re simply having a rough day and send them a quiet burst of loving kindness instead.
By consciously choosing my own inner world, I get to create peace and joy, ease and tranquility, happiness and love. And from that place, I can freely send compassion out to others.