Do not Live to Satisfy the Expectations of Others

For what does one seek recognition?

Why does one want to be praised and appreciate by others?

For me, recognition from others are my motivation to do good because through this, I can feel my value.

But when I read one chapter from The Courage to be Disliked (book), it has scenario that causes me to reflect.

Let’s say you’ve been picking up litter around your place. The thing is no one seems to notice at all. Or if they do, no one has given you any appreciation for what you’ve done, or even said a single word of thanks. Well, will you keep on picking up litter from now?

You might stop, right? I guess you’d probably lose your motivation?

This is the danger of the desire for recognition.

You already have the goal of wanting to be praised when you start picking up litter. And if you aren’t praised by anyone, you’ll either indignant (feel unworthy) or decide that you’ll never do such a thing again.

I knew that wanting to be recognized by people you like, is a normal desire but I was wrong.

We are not living to satisfy other people’s expectations.

Wishing so hard to be recognized will lead to a life of following expectations held by other people who want you to be “this kind of person” or it causes you to copy your idol. In other words, you throw away who you really are and live to other people’s lives.

Remember this: If you are not living to satisfy other people’s expectations, it follows that the other people are not living to satisfy your expectations. Someone might not act the way you want him to, but it doesn’t do to get angry. That’s only natural.

If you get that recognition, would you say that you’ve really found happiness?

For example, the main point of your studying turns out to be satisfying other people’s expectations, then that studying is going to be difficult on you because you’ll always be worried about other people looking at you and fear their judgement.

Worrying so much and fear of judgement is not good for your health, it just give more stresses. So be free and don’t live to the meet the expectations of others!

Ooppps! Except to your customers, if you are businessman you need to satisfy their expectations if you do not want to leave you (this is your responsibility). That’s different when it comes to ‘others‘.

Somehow you didn’t understand what I mean (?) You try to seek recognition and appreciation from others or you try to please everyone but I know, when the time comes or when you are already adult, you are tired to satisfy their expectations, I know you will understand this. These are the lessons given by the Philosopher from the book of The Courage to be Disliked.

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I recommend the book The Courage to be Disliked by Ichiro Kishima and Fumitake Koga because I understand about human nature and Adlerian Psychology, it helped me a lot to appreciate my worth and the chapter that I shared to you was from that book. I promise you will not regret to read that book.

I also learned from Jim Kwik (#KwikBrain), if I wanna learn faster and understand it more deeply, I must teach what I learned to someone else. So I share this to you! I hope you learned something again!