Mastering the Mindset
Mastering the Mindset
You Are Not Responsible for Other People’s Reactions
What if I told you that people’s reactions to you—good or bad—has nothing to do with you? You’ve been carrying the weight of other people’s opinions and now it's time to finally let it go. Our identity gets shaped by what we think others think of us...that keeps you from living authentically, and being able to step into your own power.
This conversation will challenge the way you see yourself and the people around you. If you’ve ever struggled with fear of judgment, people-pleasing, or the need for approval, this episode will show you the key to breaking free.
🎧 Press play now to discover the mindset shift that can change everything.
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Losing myself and finding my strength came to the conclusion that I want it all. Feeling that pressure of tryna do better. I wanna reach heights, but too scared to fall. Too scared of failure, way more scared of feeling regret. I'm not even trying, that's terrifying. I understand that chasing my goals, I bury my clocks because it takes time. I gotta go. I already know if I wanna grow, you reap what you sow. That be the case. Planting my seeds and water my base. Yeah, I make mistakes. Yeah, I know you grow in your garden, but watch for the snakes. The people that act like you're crazy, but trying this, they far away. They don't think it's possible, I think it's possible. That is just hate. If they hate themselves, cause they on the shelf. Why you create a life that you love?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:A life that you love. Loving the fact to improving yourself. Decided that you would not settle. Decided that you got the drive to do it. The road got bumped in your foot on the pedal. You go up a level, you turn up whenever. It's time for you to go put in that work. I know my work. I know what ain't gonna be easy, yeah. I know it hurt, but angles for sure. Yeah. Until it put me in this earth. Before I ride in that hearse, I'm chasing my goals.
SPEAKER_00:I'm chasing my goals. Love enough back to improving yourself. Decided that you in a settle. Decided that you got the drive to do it to go. Got more foot on the cutter. I'm fixing my goals.
SPEAKER_01:Alright, and welcome back to another episode. Thank y'all so much for being here. Uh, if you are watching along on YouTube, go ahead and like and subscribe to my channel. If you're listening on a podcast platform, please leave me a review. Also become a monthly supporter of the show. These things help me out a whole lot. You can choose the monthly amount. It could either be three, five, eight, or ten dollars, and you can cancel at any time. But why would you ever do that? But let's go ahead and jump into this episode. Um, before I start, let me just say uh, as you can see, I am not in the podcast studio. I am recording this from home, so I don't have any visual visuals for this one. Bobby is still getting his new um studio space set up. So as I wait for that, I'm just gonna give you all these episodes from home, from my desk at home. So just the audio, but the message is still good. The message will still hopefully resonate with you. Let's get into it. Today, let's talk about how you are not in control of other people's experiences in life. We're gonna talk about other people's experiences and the role you play in every one of them. And this is important because as humans, we learn or come to believe who we are based on how we perceive other people's perception of us. We build our identity of ourselves based on how we perceive other people perceiving us, how they act around us. We build our identity based on other people. And I saw a quote when I was looking into this subject, I forgot who it's from, but I like it. It says, I'm not who you think I am, I'm not who I think I am, I am who I think that you think I am. Let me say it again. It can be a little funny to comprehend at first. I'm not who you think I am, I'm not who I think I am, I am who I think that you think I am, which is what I mean when I say we build our own identity based on what people perceive or what we perceive other people's perception of us to be. We try to become what other people think of us. We need to break away from this thought process and become our true selves. Can we become who we want to become? And I want you to think about this statement. Somebody's reaction to you, whether it's good or bad, has nothing to do with you. I'ma say it again. Somebody's reaction to you, whether it's good or bad, has nothing to do with you. It has everything to do with what's happening internally with that person. Might sound crazy, but stay with me. So, first let me say this. I'm not saying that you can go out there and be a drug to people and say, hey, that's on them. They got something going on inside them that made them react like that. It's their fault. They shouldn't have reacted like that. That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that if you're a good person and acting out of a good place in everything you do, and you're um and you're true to yourself, and you're not a person who wants to harm people, then other people's reaction to you literally has nothing to do with you. This thought process is gonna help us to step into the truest version of ourselves, and here's why. So many people in life won't do what they truly want to because they don't want to ruffle any feathers, they don't want to stir the pot. What they want to do is stay invisible so they don't get negative reactions from people, and sometimes they don't want the positive reactions from other people. So many people just want to stay invisible because they don't want to they don't want people to react to them, good or bad. But understand, a person's opinion of you has everything to do with how they view the world. Every single person perceives the world differently. We all see the same world, but at the same time, it's different for each and every one of us. And our perception of the world is from all the countless experiences we have had from the time we're born to right now. Every single thing that ever happens to us and around us, that is the reason and the way we view the world. Let me give you a couple examples. So let's say you enter a man or a woman and you like them, and y'all went on a date, and you felt like they were interested in you. The date went good, it felt good, then all of a sudden they start acting distant out of nowhere. And the date ends, and they don't call you back. Now, this might not have a single thing to do with them not being interested in you, them not calling you back or not being interested in you. That has nothing to do with you. It might have been that maybe they've been cheated on, maybe they had their heart broken, and they are hesitant to get into another relationship again. Or maybe all they wanted was sex and they can tell that you ain't that kind of person and that's not what you're looking for. Maybe you remind them of their ex. Maybe they're super loyal to zodiac signs, and they made it up in their mind that your sign just won't work work with whatever sign theirs is. And none of that has anything to do with you. And having been in those situations, we know it can make you think, okay, what did I do wrong? Is there something wrong with me? But in reality, this person is re that this person is reacting to you based on all the other experiences they've had in their life. Maybe it's a protection mechanism for them. Maybe they're projecting, maybe their intentions just ain't honest. And a lot of times they ain't even thinking about these things consciously. And not only does their experiences in life have nothing to do with you, the way they perceive you has nothing to do with you. It has everything to do with how they perceive the world. And I know what you're thinking. Well, what if they just don't like me? That is something to do with me, right? For whatever reason they have in their mind for quote unquote not liking you, that ain't got nothing to do with you. That has everything to do with their dating history, what they look for in a man or a woman, because you've been in a relationship. Your partner liked you at one point, loved you at one point, you've been in a relationship. It's not like you are unlikable. Whatever experiences they done had in life has led them to view dating a certain way, and you ain't got nothing to do with that. You don't. Another example, and something I know you can relate to, is somebody who is very angry. A lot of angry folks in this world, and nobody is born angry. There ain't no such thing as an angry infant. Yeah, a baby will cry, but babies don't come into this world just pissed off at people, at life. For the most part, you don't see a bunch of frowning, mad ass babies. But at some point, people just get angry. A lot of folks are just angry, right? And maybe they were raised by a very angry adult, and now that's how they react to the world. And there's some sort of trigger, something sets a mouth, right? And the fact is, you can have you can have the same exact thing happen to two different people, and one person can be very calm and have no reaction, and the other person can get pissed off and blow up about it. And what that means is that you ain't in charge of somebody else's experience, they are in charge of that, whether they realize it or not. So don't hold yourself back in life because you worried about other people's experiences. You can't control their experiences, their reaction to whatever may be a trigger for them, whatever may be an issue, it's all based on their past experiences. And you just simply don't have nothing to do with that. All you can do is be the good person you are, be about positivity, and do what serves you, knowing that hey, however they feel, that's how they feel. Don't feel like you need to tiptoe or maneuver in a way to try and make somebody and try and not make somebody angry or to feel like you have to move in a way to not offend people or to not get the quote unquote haters, because that's gonna be impossible. It really is. And as positive as I am, as much as I try to inspire people, as much as I stay in my own lane, and I'm a person who is never about drama, I still have a handful of folks who don't like me. And one of them, I can literally point to the reason, the reason why they don't like me, even though it still has nothing to do with me. And let me tell you a story, I won't give any names. But uh, I was in a show some years ago, around Halloween time, and I was grabbing some food and a drink after the show with some people in the cast, and one of my cast members, um, one of the two or three that's my age, mentioned that they was going to a haunted house. And I'm like, oh, that's what's up. I told them that I like haunted houses, and I said that uh I might be going to this haunted zombie paintball, paintball thing. And they was like, Oh, that that sounds fun. I'm like, yeah, it does. Fast forward, I ended up going. Wasn't even that fun, by the way. I was very disappointed. But anyway, uh it was like the next weekend, and I brought it up that I went, and my cast member got so pissed off that I that I didn't invite them, that I don't hang out with theater folk. Now, mind you, this was like our fifth time at this bar getting food and a drink with the cast, with the cast of the theater folk, and it wasn't even my thing. I got invited to go with somebody to this zombie paintball thing, right? Whose friend, that friend group had invited them to go. And it even wasn't my group of friends. And I told my cast member this. I tried to explain, like, hey, how you gonna get mad at me for not inviting you to something that I got invited to? And it wasn't like they asked me, can they go with me? They just said they was going to a haunted house. So what was I supposed to do? Anyway, and maybe you think they have a valid reason to be mad at me. Well, guess what? That ain't got nothing to do with me either. Because maybe your life experiences tell you that, yeah, you should have invited that person. It would have I would have been mad at you too for not inviting me. But I don't have those same experiences as you do. I know I wasn't I was I was coming from a good place and I didn't intentionally not invite them. My intentions were pure, and that's just what that is. I was moving in the way in the best way that I could in that moment, not maliciously. Anyway, I said all that to say when somebody is looking at you and perceiving you, they are looking at the world through their own personal lens and all of the countless experiences of life they had, and it's from that that they get their perception of you. So think of this example. You ever been around a dog or seen a dog that's been abused a lot? Kind of a sad example, but that dog who's been abused is real timid, they shy away from people. If it comes towards you, it probably go run away, probably avoid you. Or if they don't run away, they try and make themselves really, really small, right? And they put their head down, and you can see the fear in them. And even though you never hit this dog, or maybe never even been around this dog, the way they see life, the experiences they have had from other people, it caused this dog to act this way towards you, right? And you have nothing to do with that. And this is how you have to rationalize the way folks either perceive you or the way they may want to place the burden of their experiences on you. They are reacting to certain stimuluses from their past. And once again, be a good person, be somebody who is positive and brings good into this world, and at the same time, understand that you are not in control of other people's experiences. And the sooner you realize this, the sooner you can be free to live a life that's true to yourself. Okay, so I said it, I said it in a few different ways. Now I'm gonna flip it on you, and you might not like to hear this next part, but I'm gonna say it anyway, and I'm gonna keep it real with y'all. Just like I always do on this podcast. So just like you ain't in control of other people's experiences, then other people ain't in control of yours. So if you're blaming people for how you feel, how you react, that ain't how it goes. Just like if somebody gets angry about something and it has and uh and has a negative reaction and it's not because of you, if you get angry at somebody else, it ain't on them, it's on you. And that might be hard to accept or believe. And at first, I ain't want to hear this. I ain't want to hear that. I didn't want to hear this either. But let's dive in a little more. How you react is completely in your hands. And it might feel like you might not have control over it, but you absolutely do. And when I was researching and I and finding material on this topic to share with y'all, I came across this quote, and it's from a man, an author, and psychologist named Victor Frankel. And he wrote this book right after the Holocaust. That and he went through it and was in a Nazi prison camp. And in his book, he talks about his experience in the prison camp and about the meaning of life and how people who had meaning in their life ended up living longer in these camps, longer than the ones who had no meaning in their life. And here's a quote I came across it says between stimulus and response is a space. And in that spot, and in that space is our power to choose our response, and in our response lies our growth and our freedom. One more time. Between stimulus and response is a space, and in that space is our power to choose our response, and in that response lies our growth and freedom. So between something happening and you reacting to it, there's a little bit of space, a very small space, probably a half a second, maybe even a fraction of a second, a split second. There's this split second between something happening to you and you reacting to it, and if you can master that space, you can master who you are within that space to not react negatively. Then if you can do that, you have mastered your life. And easier said than done, easier said than done, hell yes, I know. But you can't blame other people for how you react to them. Because just like people can't blame you for their reactions, you can't blame them for yours. You always have a choice of how you decide to respond. And I know you might feel like you might not I know you might not feel like you do, but you do. It ain't easy. We know that. It feels like it's damn near in your D E DNA, like it's just human nature to react. And that's not necessarily true. It's human to have the feeling to have the thought, but what you do with that feeling and that thought is completely your choice. And this is the uh epitome of self-development. Things happen to us in life. Let's say something happened to you years ago and you still pissed off about it, or you still hurt by it, or it's still negatively affecting you mentally. Maybe you have a negative reaction every time you think about it. And that one event is still affecting you even though it happened years ago. And personal development, this self-development thing we work on, is having something happen to you, and now it only affects you for a few months, not years. And that's a positive. Then you work on yourself some more. And first, let me say that this type of work takes a while. This work doesn't happen overnight. This takes years. So you work on yourself and other things happen to you, and now they only affect you for weeks. Time goes by, you keep working on yourself, now they only affect you for a few days. Then it happens and you're pissed off for a day. More time, more work on yourself. Something happens and you pissed off for an hour. Then something happens, you pissed off for five minutes, and then something happens in you to you, and there is no pissed off. And at that point in time is where the self-mastery is. That's self-mastery, mastery of the self. When you get to that point where that thing that used to affect you doesn't anymore, when you get to the point that things outside of your mind and your body, the external things, don't disturb your peace. And I know it might sound like some Gandhi type, hippie type, BS, and it might even sound impossible to get to that mental space, but strides still can't be made. They have to be. Because you better believe as we're working on ourselves, we're gonna be changing for the better. And unfortunately, those around us won't be doing the same. And it's gonna be many moments where your energy and your mindset just won't align with them. Friction is gonna happen. You're gonna look at things different. You're gonna be enlightened ways, enlightened in ways that not everybody around you will be. And somebody's gonna say something or do something that's gonna piss you off. Things that never used to piss you off might start pissing you off. And when these moments come, it's gonna be so damn important to protect your peace. Your peace is way more important than most of the BS the world has to offer you. All the negativity, all the ways that people in your life will inadvertently and sometimes purposely hurt you or piss you off. And I say this quote a lot on here, but no one can make you feel inferior without your consent. No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. If somebody says something to you and it's messed up and it makes you feel bad, you decided to let that make you feel that way, you decided to listen to what that person said and let it make you feel bad about yourself, you decided to take that thing to heart and let it make you feel less than. And I know that may sound impossible to not let someone's words affect you, because words, even though they are just that, just words, they can be really hurtful. But the place we have to strive to get is to be so mentally sound, so mentally strong within our own selves, to have so much mental peace, to understand that the way other people perceive us, it literally has nothing to do with us to get to the point where their words just won't work negatively on us. This is a space between the stimulus and the response. And when they do say the thing that's hurtful or that pisses you off, it's really a gift. It really is. Because now they just let you know where you need work. And I always give this example of uh big people, heavy set people, right? Where I grew up, if you was quote unquote fat and didn't do the work on yourself and you didn't learn to accept that you were bigger, if you didn't embrace that, well then them fat jokes came and it was gonna be all bad for you. And some of the most confident people I've been in a room with is somebody that a mean person will call them fat, but they just got so much confidence. Think about rappers like Big Pun, Rick Ross, Biggie, Fat Joe, Bone Crusher, and you might not know all of them, but they all big, and they all will have their shirt off in a music video, in an interview, in a concert, just big belly everywhere. So it's safe to assume that calling them fat won't hurt their feelings. Fat Joe, Big Pun, Biggie, they made it into their name. They embraced it. You better believe they got called fat when they was growing up. And I ain't saying that you have to go to that extreme about something. Let's say you're embarrassed by your teeth. I ain't saying to do what they did about that weight with your teeth, to nickname yourself pterodactyl teeth, or whatever, horrible example. That was anyway. But my point is to get to a point where somebody saying your teeth look bad don't bother you. And it can be for so many ways, but for one, your teeth don't define you, and you're gonna love everything else about yourself so much that talking about my teeth is light work. You're gonna do you gotta do way better than that to hurt me because I had these all my life, I've accepted it. And again, that space between stimulus and response. And if you're trying your best in life and taking actions towards becoming the best version of yourself to get to the most, to get the most you can out of life in a positive way, then you are not responsible for other people's reactions. And those people who are just blindly walking through life and allowing any and everything to disrupt their peace and allowing negativity to seep into their lives, into who they are, then the same is true. They aren't responsible for your reactions. You have to be. And this won't be easy, but with some work and some ownership of your actions and reactions, you can and will protect that inner peace. So, again, you are not responsible for other people's reactions to you, and other people aren't responsible for your reactions to them. So, that's what I got for you today. Man, uh, if you like this episode, please share it to your social medias, your social medias, your socials. It helps me uh out a whole lot. Also become a supporter of the show. Again, you can choose the monthly amount, it can be three, five, eight, or ten dollars. Let's go ahead and get to this music though. The song I got for y'all today is It All Makes Sense. Let's ride out. You ain't got a touch to know my real. Close your eyes, you can hear. I tasted too many tears. It got me thinking. If you really feel me, that I'ma make sense. I feel like, like the sound really touching me. I can feel the rush in me. Oh, what a feelin'. It feels like I'm on the high, like I can touch the ceiling. I felt it in my heart right from the beginning. You can tell I'ma cancer. I'm here talking about my feelings. Not to be too touchy, but your words are never killed me. Hope you felt that. And I've been tryna touch a million. I wanna touch the final thing, wanna touch all kind of things. Take me to the cemetery, let me touch my mama grave. Think about my past, I've been seeing all kinda things. Twenty-twenty hindsight, probably shouldn't drop some things. Okay, I see now. Yeah, I see now. Look me in my eye, nigga. Tell me what you see, huh? I see progress, I see prosper, I can see the treetops. I swear I hear the birds, and that the music to my ears. And I taste one of my tears. Thinking how I persevere, but you ain't got a touch. You can hear, I tasted too many tears. It got me thinking. If you really feel me, that all makes sense. You ain't got a touch to know I'm real, close your eyes. You can hear, I tasted too many tears. It got me thinking. If you really feel me. Uh-uh, that all makes sense. I feel like you niggas' feelings never matter to me. I feel like Urka family matters to me. Feel me or not? I feel for George Floyd's family. His life matters to me. I feel like I can feel the damage in me. Feel me or not, but I feel like I'm one of the realest rappers I see. I look around and look the same as far as that I can see. You see it? You see my three fingers, you see me, let 'em linger. I made my own lane, won't never see a blinker. Once on myself, that's a failure. Let me tell you, the victory never taste the sweeter. And keep my name out your mouth. I hope it tastes like ether. I wanna taste her deepest thoughts and desires. Do what it requires to keep her coming. I make sure she arrives. I watch the news with a divide, they gotta thinking different. At Donald Trump, got white people out here thinking ignorant, thinking like some bigots. They gotta make me feel, but you ain't gotta touch. Yeah. See, I can't speak for nobody else but me. But believe me when I tell you, all I want for you to do is feel me. You feel me? You ain't gotta touch to know I'm real. Close your eyes. You can hear taste it too many tears, it got me thinking. I'm not looking for no handouts or no pats on the back or no favors. I just want you to feel me. You ain't gotta touch it. To know I'm real, close your eyes. You can hear I tasted too many tears. It got me thinking. If you really feel me, it all makes sense.