CRISIS DOESN'T BUILD CHARACTER

Now I understand.

To me, sharing my story was scary at first, when it mattered to me what people’s reaction would be. When I was thinking about how their judgement would affect ME.

I was making it all about me. So what happens when you get over that, and you do share, and you are vulnerable? What happens when you are putting your best foot forward day after day and somewhere along the line someone misinterprets your intentions?

If feels terrible. It feels a little bit like you are being attacked. The worst part is that you just told the whole world that you were insecure in your 20's and now you feel embarrassed because someone is pointing a finger at you and it hurts. There is no shield to protect you, all you have is you.

So what do you immediately want to do? Hide. Retract everything you’ve put out there. Again… making it about me.

So, if someone has misinterpreted your intentions take a look at what’s transpired, figure out your part in it, apologize if need be and move forward. The only thing you can control is your response to the situation. You don’t know what is going on in their life, you don’t know the lens they are looking through all you know is that they’ve misinterpreted what you were trying to do. If you know your true intentions and they are pure, that will always shine through.

To paraphrase what my mentor Zach Slobin said, “Crisis doesn’t build character, it reveals it.” Keep going and let your light shine on. 💫