If you’re tired of being afraid to put yourself out there then you need to overcome feeling judged by others.
And that’s exactly what we’re going to talk about today.
I’m about to share with you the exact same process that I’ve used to feel more confident in any social situation.
What You'll Learn In This Post
1. Question Your Limiting Beliefs
Remember, you are not your thoughts.
If you want to overcome feeling judged by others, then you need to be able to question your limiting beliefs.
Don’t just believe everything your mind tells you right away.
Check out this video if you want to know how to stop being shy and overcome social anxiety.
In fact, this reminds me of a client that I worked with before.
Due to previous rejections, he started to assume that people were going to spit at him if he tried talking to them.
As crazy, as it sounded, he believed that to be true.
Because of that fear, he avoided interacting with people for so long until we started working together.
If you want to figure out how to stop second-guessing yourself, you have to challenge your assumptions.
Instead of always focusing on the worst-case scenario, why not do the opposite?
That could happen too, you know?
The next time you interact with someone, take the lead and be warm towards them right away.
To help you with this, just imagine how you’d treat an old friend that you haven’t seen in a while.
Take the lead and be warm towards people right away.
When you assume that you’ll get along well with others, then you’ll act in ways to make that happen.
As a result, you’ll be able to get along with anybody much faster.
2. Practice Self-Compassion
Remember, how you treat yourself will dictate how others treat you as well.
That’s why you need to have a good relationship with yourself first.
Unfortunately, those who struggle socially are so mean to themselves.
If that sounds like you, then you need to practice self-compassion.
Whenever you mess something up, be more encouraging.
From Shy To Social
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Talk to yourself the same way you would to someone you care about.
By doing so, you’ll gain the confidence to speak up and not put up poor treatment from others.
Unless you do this, you’ll always attract abusive people into your life so keep that in mind.
By talking to yourself in a more positive way, you’ll be less afraid to take risks and make mistakes.
3. Set Your Boundaries
Like I said earlier, those who experience a great deal of anxiety are so worried about what others think of them.
From what I’ve noticed, it’s because they haven’t taken the time to define what their boundaries are.
Check out this podcast interview with Dr. Michael Pariser, Author of No More Mr. Nice Guy – The Hero’s Journey, where he talks about how to cure nice guy syndrome.
In order to overcome feeling judged by others, you have to decide what is and isn’t acceptable for you.
To help you get started, take some time to reflect.
Think of previous events and circumstances that made you feel good and made you feel bad.
Write those down so you have something tangible that you can refer to when defining your preferences.
To give you an example from my own life, getting good sleep is really important to me.
That’s why I leave social events earlier compared to others.
As a result, some people make fun of me and tease me about it.
But because I know that feeling rested is a priority for me, their remarks don’t bother me one bit.
Again, if you want to figure out how to be assertive without being rude, you need to know what you like and don’t like.
The more aware you are of things that matter to you, the less you’ll care about the opinions of others.
4. Evaluate Who’s Criticizing You
You don’t know what you don’t know until someone shows you how.
In order to make improvements, it’s important that you get some feedback.
If you’re wondering how to not take things personally, you have to evaluate who’s criticizing you.
Do they have something that you want?
Are they someone you like and respect?
Do they have your best intention in mind?
If the answer to those questions is yes, then you need to avoid being defensive.
Take their feedback into consideration because that’s going to help you improve.
On the other hand, if the answer is no, then what they think of you is irrelevant.
Whoever is judging you is probably just projecting how they feel which has nothing to do with you.
The way I see it unless they have good intentions and they’re adding value in your life then their opinion of you shouldn’t matter.
5. Validate Yourself
From what I’ve noticed, people-pleasers don’t feel good enough on their own.
They seek validation externally instead of giving it to themselves.
But in order to overcome feeling judged by others, you need to affirm your worth.
If you want to learn how to like yourself, make an effort to think of your positive traits and previous accomplishments more often.
In fact, this is one of the best confidence-building exercises that I know.
If you do this long enough, you’ll realize that you’re actually pretty awesome.
This will help you improve your self-image and you’ll be less intimidated by others.
6. Be Empathetic
Those who struggle socially tend to make everything about them.
If you want to figure out how to be less self-conscious, you have to be empathetic.
Put yourself in other people’s situations and try to consider where they’re coming from.
For example, I’m generally a very outgoing person.
But, I’m not in a very social mood if I’m not feeling all that great.
That’s why you have to learn how to not take things personally.
At the end of the day, you have no idea what’s going on in people’s lives.
Maybe the person who turned you down is having a bad day and they happened to take it out on you.
You can’t know for sure what they’re thinking about so avoid jumping to conclusions right away.
By taking the time to see another point of view, you’ll become a more understanding person.
You won’t be as sensitive and you’ll get less offended when things don’t go your way.
My advice for you is to only focus on what you can control.
The rest, you just have to let it go.
7. Put Things Into Perspective
If you tend to make a big deal out of small things, then you have to be able to see the bigger picture.
Whenever you feel like you’re making a mountain out of a molehill, ask yourself, “Will this matter a year from now?”
I find that whenever I ask myself that question, it quickly snaps me out of overthinking.
Believe it or not, nobody is paying as much attention to you as you might assume.
Think about it.
Unless it was recent or something really bad happened, you probably don’t remember embarrassing things that others did, right?
Even if you do something silly or make a mistake, I can assure you that people would’ve forgotten about you at the end of the day.
By putting things into perspective, you’ll be less likely to beat yourself up mentally.
8. Create A Vision For Your Life
Remember, the size of your problem is directly proportional to how meaningful your life is.
It’s easy to worry about what people think of you when you don’t have anything to work towards.
In order to overcome feeling judged by others, you need to create a vision for your life.
Having something worthwhile to pursue will give you a greater sense of meaning and fulfillment.
To help you get started, ask yourself what would you do if you know you can’t fail and money wasn’t an issue.
Remember, your mind can only contain one thought at any given moment.
By having clear goals that you’re excited about, you’ll be too preoccupied to sweat the small stuff.
As mentioned before, you’ll care less about what others think because you know what’s really important to you.
Once you have your goals written out, I encourage you to review them regularly.
Also, take the time to connect the emotions behind them.
By doing so, you’ll keep yourself motivated and you’ll still take action even if you don’t feel like it.
9. Get Rid Of Toxic Relationships
Keep in mind that your environment shapes how you turn out to be.
It’s going to be difficult to make any progress towards your goals if you’re surrounded by individuals who don’t support you.
Remember, your needs are totally valid.
But you can’t ask people to give you what you want if they’re not able or willing to.
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To overcome feeling judged by others, you need to consistently evaluate your relationships.
If you don’t get rid of toxic people in your life, they will continuously drag you down and make things difficult for you.
The reality is, it doesn’t matter who you are and what you do.
There’s no way you’ll be able to get along with everybody so don’t even try.
At the end of the day, there are billions of people in the world.
You never have to put yourself in circumstances where you have to compromise what you value.
Your goal is to become the best version of yourself.
And then find others who will encourage you and support your growth.
10. Do What Scares You
There’s no way around it.
In order to overcome feeling judged by others, you need to develop your courage.
The best way to do this is to gradually expose yourself to situations that you’re afraid of.
Check out this video if you want to know how to be outgoing if you have social anxiety.
In order to become more socially adept, make sure you start small.
For now, just try making eye contact and smiling at people who walk past you.
Once you’re comfortable doing that, say hello and ask them how their day is going.
Later on, you can engage people in small talk and try to have longer conversations.
Do you see how that works?
When you’re starting out, you need to lower the bar so you can build positive momentum.
Just pick the easiest and simplest thing that you can do and get started there.
Keep doing that until you have a good handle on it.
And then, try to make improvements incrementally.
Eventually, you’ll be able to do the thing that you’re afraid of.
By doing this consistently, you’ll build your confidence and raise your self-esteem.
You’ll prove to yourself that you’re capable of going for what you want if you set your mind to it.
The more fears you overcome, the more empowered you’re going to feel.
Conclusion
If you’re wondering how to overcome feeling judged by others, I just shared with you my best tips.
Feel free to go through them again and implement them as much as you can.
And now, let’s turn it to you.
Which one of these tips are you going to implement first?
Are you going to set your boundaries or evaluate who’s criticizing you?
Send me a message on Instagram and let me know.