If you leave your house today, Joe guarantees, you will disappoint someone, be judged, and be criticized. Designing your life to avoid these things doesn’t work — and it carries a hidden cost. The people who constantly chase approval were usually taught their whole lives that’s what they’re supposed to do, but the strategy quietly turns them against themselves.
“If I’m constantly trying to make sure that you’re happy with me, then I’m not putting any attention to what makes me happy with me.”
Trying to keep everyone else happy will drive you insane, but more importantly it splits your attention away from your own inner peace. Every unit of energy spent managing others’ opinions is a unit not spent on your relationship with yourself. And the prize never comes anyway: approval is momentary, judgment returns the next day, so the chase has no end. Joe calls perfectionism “chasing the dragon” — there’s simply no way to make it work.
The alternative isn’t to harden against people’s opinions but to come back to the present and ask what you need to be good with yourself right now. From there, you’re no longer separated from yourself, and paradoxically you become far more able to actually see and connect with the people whose approval you were chasing.
Related Concepts
- Peace with yourself is only available right now
- Self-possession is what people are actually attracted to
- We push away the approval we seek
- No amount of external validation works if you won’t validate yourself
- Seeing others dissolves their judgment and criticism
- Seeking approval pushes away the very connection you want