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You’re cruising along in life doing the best you can, working on making things happen. And BAM, you’re stung by a negative comment, a judgmental friend or a rude stranger. Welcome to the hater zone.
Haters seem to spring up when we try to a great job. A critic of your parenting skills, your relationship status (or lack thereof), how you dress, where you live or your weight. Maybe you smile too much, or not enough. At the end of all the haters’ catcalls is an invitation to low self-esteem and self-loothing-ville.
I recently came into a stream of haters lashing out, bad book reviews, attacking my writing style and criticizing my teaching methods. Of course, having thick skin can help. But no matter who we are, the negative words can pierce.
Haters can affect us in two ways. They may creep out and attack us for things we are doing or sharing. Or the idea of them can prevent us from moving forward and expressing our true self. Both are detrimental to our sprit.
Many of my life coaching clients express their fear of moving forward because of what haters might say or do. If they publish the book, or leave the job in corporate, what will those around them think?
Are you actually allowing what people could say to stop you from following your own heart?
I have a friend who writes music. She was terrified of releasing her first song because of what people would say if she expressed her truth. When we fear haters, it is because we lack self-confidence. The best way to get rid of negativity is to build self-confidence.
When we hide ourselves from the world, we cannot heal.
The internal pain and guilt we feel is actually a manifestation of inner conflict from avoiding expressing our true selves. This angst can disappear when we express ourselves honestly and confidently.
Some people take great joy in pointing out our flaws, imperfections or inadequacies. The more we express your true selves, the more opportunity the haters have to pop out and try to bring us down. But this is no reason to avoid being our best selves.
If you have negativity in your life or haters trying to bring you down, or if you are worried about expressing a part of yourself fully because of potential haters, then these simple steps can help.
1. Feel Your Feelings
I have another friend who is cautions to write his first book because he is worried about what his family will say. It can be tough to fully put yourself out there. Even if you are not a writer, we all have dreams and goals that require us to step forward into the unknown. This process can feel scary, until you look at your feelings and express your authentic self.
The more you express your true self and real feelings, the more the world will respond. When you do things, write a song or follow your heart and leave a job you hate, you may feel backlash from society or people close to you, aka haters. But rest assured, when you are doing it for the right reasons, you will feel more freedom and happiness than you ever thought possible.
The key is to be present with your feelings and process them. If you feel burned by a friend or hurt by the stagers comment on your blog, feel the feelings fully.
2. Detach from Defending
It can be tempting to fight fire with fire, but in the history of mankind this has never worked. More importantly, you are coming down to the level of the hater. What they want is to get your attention. And by defending yourself or attacking them, you give them that.
Instead, go inward and ask yourself where in your life you feel unsafe or ungrounded? From a spiritual energetic standpoint, haters and judgmental people come at us when we are feeling vulnerable. Instead of feeling victimized, become accountable and protect yourself by asking, “What can I do to feel more confident and secure?”
3. Express Love
Recognize what people say and do is a reflection of them not you, so believing what they say is your choice. You can choose love and self-worth by aligning yourself with your inner truth. When negative comments bring you down, surround yourself with love and focus on the positive.
What about you… what step will you take to protect yourself from negative comments, people or situations? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments?
Thanks, Shannon, for the inspiring words! I always look forward to your Friday videos. They start my day off right!
Know that this listener/ reader supports you all the way! Much love!
Thanks for a great post! Completely agree with everything you talked about. May love and light be with you 🙂
Peace and love to you!
I really NEEDED to see these words to empower me. I live in Atlanta, Georgia where the haters have their headquarters. I’ve lived in a lot of places but this is the worse. They holler out obscenities when they cut you off in traffic, they push pass you attempting to get to the door before you. Thank you for your encouraging words, in order to get a heads up on these haters. Thank you!
Thanks for shining a light into those dark places, so more of us can see clearly.
Thank you immensely for everything.
Thankyou – I really needed to hear this today. You always make things so much clearer and easier to understand. You have helped me grow so much in the short time that I have been getting your emails.
Hey lovely lady Im so glad that you are putting your message out into the world and not holding back on what is true to you. I love your videos and the advice you give is fantastic. Haters generally are jealous they are not emotionally capable of expressing their feelings in a productive way. This video is such a fantastic way of showing the world that love is the answer. Im also learning in my life that some people are not as advanced along the path of life as I am. I don’t mean this in a mean spirited way it just means they haven’t dealt with themselves emotionally. Life is hard but the hard experiences in life are always teaching us lessons. Keep doing what you’re doing hun you deserve all the happiness the world has to offer and thanks for showing us a great way to deal with negativity. Love n hugs – Mel
Dear Shannon
Your messages are so inspiring. Thank you for sharing all this with us
love, bea
Thank you… it has taken me a long time to get on the right path and actually share the things I am passionate about. Every now and then I seem to fall off the track a little but reading this has reminded me what I need to do.
Thank you.
Dear Shannon,
I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for this article. I can’t express in words how deeply this article touched me and helped me. I am South Asian young woman, who is constantly being put down by my family for still being unmarried at 27, it really hurts when the same small minded people who told you your whole life that girls are supposed to stay at home and not socialize much, turn around and constantly badger you about your lack of a significant other. I came across your article by chance, and I am glad I did, like you said, it is up to me to decide if I want the haters to affect me or not, and that I need to focus on the positives in my life and not let anyone else bring me down. I am smart, have a good stable job, close friends that I know are there for me, an awesome little sister, and although I know I am not that attractive or skinny, I am pretty in my own unique way. Thank you Shannon for reminding me that the only person’s opinion that should matter to me is my own.
Hi Shannon,
You are awesome! This is so helpful! Thank you!