An interesting thing happened after I posted “We Need to Talk” - I was flooded (ish) with kind emails from readers.  Which made me feel good.  Which made me want to post more.  Which is exactly what I shouldn’t be doing.

Wait … Why?

Here’s the deal: it’s fantastic to have the approval of others.  It’s a high.  I want people to like me.  I crave it!  I think many of us do.  (That’s certainly what Ariel is saying in the Authenticity vs. Attention post.)

But that high comes with a downside: “The very thing that gives you pleasure today will give you pain tomorrow, or it will leave you, so its absence will give you pain.” (Eckhart Tolle)

In other words: I have your approval now - but what of tomorrow?  What if I do something you dislike then?  If I lend credence to your positive emails, then, unless I establish some sort of false construct, I must by definition lend credence to the negative commentary, as well.  Either way, I’m allowing someone else’s opinion to establish or influence how I feel about myself.  It’s a dangerous - and unwinnable - game, isn’t it?

Okay, all that having been said, I honestly have NO IDEA how I’m going to change years and years of my kneejerk reaction: to please, to perform, to make people laugh, to entertain them (often at my expense).

Hmm.