How can we avoid being over-concerned about others’ feelings?

Answer Podcast:

Transcript

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If someone is very conscious about what others feel about me, then will that be bigger problem in his life? When somebody offers food and we say no, because it’s not prasad, what will he think about it? Is that your question? No, no.
It’s an example. Okay. Basically, if one is too concerned about feelings of others, what should one do? See, being concerned about others’ feelings is natural and desirable sensitivity.
We all need to be sensitive about how others feel. But at the same time, sensitivity is not the only basis for our activity. Hey, a doctor is performing a surgery.
The doctor knows that the surgery is going to cause a tissue failure. Still, the doctor doesn’t stop the surgery just because he doesn’t want to watch it. You know, there is a higher purpose.
Similarly, we don’t want to know what others think about us. That is natural. We are social creatures.
And we will actually think about what others think about us. But whether others’ perceptions about us should alone determine our actions. That is sometimes the entire critical consideration.
So, if we have certain higher principles, which we want to live according to, then we can try to present those principles and act upon those principles in a way that minimizes others’ feeling hurt or others’ feeling bad about it. But we can’t let them alone determine what we should be doing. Because then the big question is not who are the others.
Others are not one homogenous impersonal oneness. Others, there are millions of others. And they all have their own opinions about what we should be doing.
As a matter of fact, even the same person has different opinions about what we should be doing at different times. So, one of the easiest ways to make ourselves miserable is to try to make everyone happy. So, we just can’t do that enough.
It’s not possible that we can make everyone happy. So, we have to make choices. And if we understand the principles of Krishna Consciousness, if we understand that we are massively miserable, and we miss Krishna, then our heart becomes sick.
We have driven the material reputation. Yes, everyone is concerned about how we are created. And that’s not wrong.
But again, we have to be concerned about our reputation among people. If we want to be reputed among materialists, we have to become materialists like them, better than them. If we want to be reputed among devotees, we have to become like devotees.
And good devotees. High quality devotees. So, it is a natural human need to want some level of acceptability and respectability in whatever social circle we are in.
The solution is, or rather what will create a desire of how do we become, will depend on which social circle we choose to belong to. Which social circle we strive for acceptability and respectability. We cannot possibly be in all social circles.
Even in college. There can be so many different social groups. This club wants to become our religion.
We become our religion. We can’t please everyone. So, as devotees, if our heart is situated in the devotee circle, then we focus more on being acceptable and respectable.
We have to be in the devotee circle. Karuna is a very good example. A good person who became bad because of bad association.
He wanted to be accepted and respected by Duryodhana. And that’s why he draws all sorts of materialistic things. He proposed that Draupadi be consumed.
And later on he repeats that bitterness. Ashutosh has spoken about that. He tells that to Krishna.
He tells that to Vishnu also. But he did that because he wanted to be accepted in Duryodhana’s circle. So, we have to see, our need for acceptance, it’s not just something which is driven by the devotee.
It is something which is part of our human nature. But we have to choose that social circle which brings out our higher self. Not our lower self.
And when we are associating with others, part of the devotees, we can refine things in such a way that we don’t provoke them too much. So, they don’t have to get into that. Ultimately, in material life, there are certain things which matter.
India is also becoming more and more post-modern. In post-modernism, you can do whatever you want. It’s more like that.
If something works for you, that’s great. But don’t impose it on people. So, that’s their idea.
As I said, I came from America. There are many devotees in America. In America, it doesn’t matter.
There is one devotee who was a quadruped maturer. He is an IIT faculty graduate. He works in England.
He just goes for all parties. Whatever has to go, he just takes vegetables and salads over there. Everybody knows that.
And nobody bothers him. So, he has found his own place. And in general, if people find that we are holdable, they will hold us into a xeroscopy of themselves.
Are they right? But if people find that they are not holdable, as long as we are productive according to general parameters of success, as a student, we get good marks, as a professional, if we are doing a job, people will leave us alone. So, we would not worry so much about what others thought about us if we knew how little others thought about us. We wouldn’t worry so much about what others thought about us if we knew how little others thought about us.
That means we have not said, Oh, if I speak like this, if I look like this, if I don’t eat, what will people think about me? Everyone has their own problems. Everyone has their own life. How much people will think about us? It will be painful for us to think that people don’t think about us much.
But isn’t it true? How much do we think about others? Probably, when we meet them, we think about them. And when they do something, we say, Why did you do like this? But after all, we have our own life to live. So, people also have their own life to live.
So, after all, we think more about what they think about us than what they think about us. So, if you recognize this, that everybody is bothered with their own life. And people don’t worry too much.
People don’t make a big case about how others are behaving. Unless that our behavior starts harboring them really directly. But then, they may become vindictive or something.
But overall, if we are doing our own thing in a non-inclusive way, then people will leave us alone and we can continue to be artists. Thank you very much.