Date Yourself Instead - Not everyone is going to like you

Episode Date: April 17, 2023

Not everyone is going to like you or accept you - that's just how life is. The most important thing is that YOU like you. In this episode, I talk about my personal experiences with how people treated me poorly for no apparent reason at all - and what those experiences taught me. If you enjoyed this episode, always feel free to DM me on instagram @lyss and @dateyourselfinstead.

Hi everyone and welcome to another episode of Date Yourself Instead. I was supposed to take a flight out to New York City this morning but it's pouring out in Miami and I thought I would just be a better time to leave tomorrow instead so I changed my flight because I had a new episode idea and I couldn't help but turn on my microphone and start recording because I think this episode is really important and it's something that should be talked about. So let's dive right in. You weren't put on this earth for every other single person to be obsessed with you and to love you and admire you. You were not put on this earth for other people to give you constant validation. You were not put on this earth to receive praise from every single person that steps into your path

and from every single person that surrounds you. Life is short and we've been conditioned and programmed and wired to see constant validation from other people at every fucking hour of the day. I'm extremely guilty of this. I used to validate myself from men all the time. Men in particular because I felt really attractive when a man would hit on me and I felt really pretty and it would boost my confidence and it would stroke my ego and I constantly made it a challenge for myself to get the hottest guys I could and to get

anyone that I set my eyes on because it made me feel better about myself. And we often do this in our relationships. We can do this with people that we want to be friends with, if we want to be well-liked. We can do this in any area of our life, really. Trying to receive validation from things and external factors and people and situations and promotions and whatever it is that'll stroke our ego and make us feel good, we're constantly trying to hold on to that because it makes us feel happy temporarily, it makes us feel more confident in the moment and it's easy to get sucked into this idea of if everyone likes me

Then my life is gonna be perfect if everyone likes me then I'll like myself more if everyone likes me and approves of me And accepts me I'm gonna be a better person and I'm gonna be more confident and shine if they approve of me And if they like me, I'm gonna like myself more. I think that's the narrative I've always told myself as well where if other people are going to accept me and like me and think I'm pretty and cool and they love my personality and what I bring to the table, then suddenly all my problems would magically disappear. I'd never be insecure again and I'd live my life like a celebrity. When in reality celebrities are often plagued with their own issues and problems and their lives are not perfect even though

It could seem like that and they have a ton of mental health issues and a lot of celebrities get into drugs and crazy lifestyles because They are trying to constantly fulfill voids within themselves and I'm not labeling celebrities as miserable I'm just saying that we often perceive celebrities as having this grandiose luxury, amazing lifestyle, but they come with their own problems too. Everyone is human. Everyone has their own shit and their own baggage. And what you see on the outside is not what it is at all on the inside ever. Not that I'm anyone too special, but I do have some sort of status to some people

because I have a big following on social media. And I can confirm that I have probably had the shittiest three years of my entire life. People thought my life was perfectly fine because I would post myself in Greece, I would post myself in different countries. I don't know, I'm just giving random examples, but I would post my life on social media and I would get DMs all the time. Oh my god, your ship looks amazing. You look so happy. I wish I had your life. Can you teach me how to do it, etc. and I was sitting in my bed historically crying at 95% of the time. I guess my point is regardless of how many people approve of you, how many people like you,

if you don't like yourself and you don't love who you are for yourself and only for yourself, that temporary ego stroke, that temporary validation and that satisfaction that you feel from someone praising you all the fucking time, it's never gonna last. It's always a temporary high and then you're back sitting with your emotions in your room feeling lonely unless People are constantly continuing to feed your ego. You shouldn't seek validation from someone else and need that boost to constantly feel happy and good about yourself and it took a lot of learning lessons and a lot of life Experiences for me to really wrap my head around that because I always felt like I was on the outside and I've spoken about this in other episodes where I felt really not welcome and not accepted by a lot of people in the social media space. I just felt like this superficial weird energy when I would go to LA for work.

I would meet people and if you didn't have a following and you didn't have over a million followers, you know, something silly like that. You were looked at as like not as important and it's a business, right? And the world of social media can be really fake because people become friends because they all have followers and they've built followings from a couple of their videos going viral and then all of a sudden their BFFs. But I just try to think of it like this like would they be friends if it wasn't for their following? I really don't think so.

Sometimes beautiful friendships do form from social media, but a lot of the times from what I've seen, people have treated me a certain way solely because of the numbers on my Instagram account or my TikTok. Now I just kind of laugh at it. I think it's pretty humorous because I can see right through people, but this happens all the time where people bond solely because of their status and I just think it can be draining,

exhausting and it's not really a strong foundation to build a friendship on or relationship on. And it's hard to accept that sometimes people don't like us. It's hard to accept that sometimes people don't like us. It's hard to accept that sometimes people don't want to be our best friend and don't want to like us. And it can be so frustrating sometimes when you know you're a good person and you have good intentions and you have a good heart. And for some reason, someone just doesn't fucking like you.

You don't know what it is. The energy is just weird, it feels off, and whether it's a guy or whether it's a woman that you want to be friends with or whoever, really, just someone that fucking hates you for no reason, and you're like, what did I do? I feel like I've been nothing but kind, I've been nothing but a good person. I don't understand why this person does not like me. It can really bruise your ego and it can really hurt your ego because it makes no sense logically. You did nothing wrong to them, you've only had a few conversations with this person,

or it's a friend of a friend and you've met them a couple times and you've been nothing but respectful and kind and a good person towards them, but they're giving you a cold shoulder where they just don't want to let you into their bubble that they have. They don't wanna, there's some sort of barrier, there's some sort of wall between the two of you and you could feel it energetically, but you're like, I don't understand why this person

doesn't wanna accept me, I don't understand why this person treats me like I'm nothing, like it doesn't add up, like the, it doesn't understand why this person treats me like I'm nothing, like it doesn't add up, like the, it doesn't make any sense. It could be so frustrating and I'm gonna tell you an experience that I had when I was much younger that still traumatizes me to this day. It replays in my head, like it's traumatic because I feel like I'm not confrontational by any means. I don't like confrontation. I don't like going up to someone and telling them

what's on my mind because I do have the fear of being not like sometimes. And I've always been this way. I just don't like confronting situations. If someone doesn't like me, I just kind of get the hint and I run away. And when I was 15 years old, I got a job working at this ice cream place. During high school, I was serving ice cream.

I don't know. I don't remember exactly how long I worked there for, but it was definitely over six months. And my boss was the biggest bitch I've ever met in my entire life for no good reason. There was no explanation for why she treated me like total garbage 24-7, but no exaggeration. I felt like it was illegal from how poorly she was treating me. And she wasn't treating anyone else that way. She was super nice to everyone else that worked in the store, but for some reason she had it out for me. I have no idea. So she would cut my hours by 70%, so I was barely working and I used to work a lot

more, but when she was hired, because she wasn't the original boss at the time, and then she came and took over, she was hired and she cut my hours by 70%. So I was barely in the store, and I kept asking her, why are you cutting my hours? I'm working here. I've been working here for a few months now,

so I don't understand why all of a sudden my hours are changing. She's like, we're hiring new people people and we don't need you as much. I was like, okay, but I was here first so I don't understand why you are giving all these hours to other people when I put in my time and I've been working here. And that was the first issue. She started telling me that I was incapable of doing my job, which was essentially making cups of ice cream for people. And I was doing it just fine.

You just had to pull a lever on an ice cream machine, put some ice cream in a cup, and put some sprinkles and toppings on it, and serve it to customers. I think I was doing a pretty decent job. Not to say that it's not a skill to make and serve ice cream, but it was pretty simple and straightforward. And I think I was doing it just fine.

And she would stand over me and watch me and hawk over me like a fucking eagle, while I was serving ice-cream to people like breathing on the ice-cream and watching my every little move that I was making as I was serving customers. If I even spilled like a drop of ice cream outside of the cup, she started screaming at me. She was 100% verbally abusive towards me. Anytime

I would try to bring up an issue I had with her or try to speak up and stand up for myself, because I didn't know why she had such a problem with who I was, she would turn her whole body away from me as I would try to communicate with her, and I would be talking to her side profile. So she wouldn't even look at me when I would try to talk to her about anything. And if I had a concern or a customer ask for something and I didn't have the answer, I would go to her and she would turn sideways towards me. So she wouldn't look at me when I would ask her about something. And it was so degrading, humiliating, it just felt so weird.

And keep in mind, I was 15 years old. As a 15 year old, you don't know how to handle something like that. When someone twice or age is treating you like trash, you just kind of take it. And I was mortified. I just didn't know how to communicate with this person. And I was embarrassed that she was running the store and There was a couple times where she would treat me really poorly and the other

Employees would look at me and I could see that they wanted to say something But they were also too afraid to stand up for me or maybe they just didn't give a shit I don't know but I felt like I was in it by myself Living out a nightmare at work every single day and I was really devastated and I started coming home crying because it got to the point where she was so verbally abusive towards me that I couldn't handle it anymore I just started crying and I was terrified to go into work I was scared to see my boss When I would go in to work every day or it wasn't every day

because she cut my hours but whenever I did go into work I was terrified. There was one day where I finally got the courage to raise my voice at her but raise my voice still in a respectful way because I don't even know how to yell at people. I get scared of I'm literally scared of everything so I went into work and before I even started working I walked straight up to her and I was like, what is your problem with me? Why do you not like me? What's going on? You treat everyone else so much better than me and so differently than me. What did I do to you? What's going on? For the first time she actually did look at me and she kind of turned her body towards me and that was a miracle in itself

And she just said I don't know I don't know and she kept saying I don't know and like diverting her eyes to the floor And she couldn't make eye contact with me so After that She kind of backed off a little bit and energetically she wasn't at my ass that day But I remember still feeling really uncomfortable and awkward because she barely spoke to me after that and it was very awkward and weird and that was it. And I leave the store and I tell my mom what's going on.

And my mom is a little bit different than I am. My mom is extremely confrontational. She's a Gemini. I'm a Capricorn. I don't know if it's a Capricorn thing where we're more reserved and we don't like to express how we feel as often But my mom is a fucking Gemini, okay? So I tell my mom what's going on and she's like oh hell no like you are not speaking in my daughter that way That is beyond fucked up and if you don't speak up for yourself, I'm gonna speak up for you

So she drives me to work and she barges into the store and curses this lady out. And she curses this woman out, like hard core yelling at this woman and cursing her out and saying, don't you ever fucking talk to my daughter that way. Blah blah blah. I'm not going to say the rest of what she said, but she stood up for me to say the least. And it's some words that I would never, in a million years, say to anyone, because I'm just not wired that way. I would have never had the courage on the end of the balls to do what my mom did that day,

but my mom actually defended me. And that woman never spoke a bad word to me ever again. She was super polite to me from that day on and eventually I just quit because it was still really awkward for me and I couldn't handle it and I was still getting anxiety every time I went into work. But from that moment forward, she liked me. But the truth is there was no reasoning

behind why this woman didn't like me. There was no actual explanation or reasoning behind why she treated me the way that she did. It was her own issues. Whatever she was dealing with, whatever problems she had going on in her life, she was clearly projecting it at me. It had nothing to do with me and everything to do with her and who she was. You cannot control how someone treats you. You cannot control how someone feels about you. You cannot control how someone perceives you. The only thing you control is who you are and how you feel and how you express yourself on a daily basis. And if someone's treating you like total shit and garbage for no fucking reason, let them sit with that. Let them sit with that toxic energy and let them be a shitty person and don't take anything personally.

It's not on you, it's on them. Whatever they're going through, whatever they're battling, that's their problem to deal with. I'm happy to say now that I'm 30. I'm definitely more confrontational person than I was when I was 15. 15 years have passed.

I've learned so much along the way and I can definitely say that I've taken a lot of learning lessons with me throughout being treated like shit, throughout my experiences, a feeling run over, like I wasn't enough, like people didn't approve of me. I've definitely learned that it's so important to stand your ground and know your worth and know your value and know that if someone's treating you like total crap, you should stand up for yourself and you should protect your peace. And if they're not willing to communicate with you in a mature and normal and peaceful way, it's your job to just protect yourself and walk away from the situation.

In that situation, even though I was much younger, I made the decision to quit my job and find a new job because I wasn't happy. And I felt like too much had happened and I had gone through enough, and it was a situation that couldn't be mended. And as much as it sucked because I was out of a job for a couple of months, honestly, it was worth protecting my energy and my peace, and it was worth finding a new place to work, so I could actually walk into work and not have a panic attack every fucking day. I had another wild experience like this as well, that really traumatized me for a long time because it made me feel like

I was not enough based on who I was and based on my identity. And this happened when I was in middle school. This was a little bit, now I was a little bit younger and I was auditioning for this talent show that my school was putting together. And I was singing a song about Jesus. Now, I am not religious. Okay, this is like so random. But I was singing a song about Jesus.

Jesus take the wheel by Carrie Underwood. I am not religious. Okay, I respect religion and I value the principles. Like a lot of religions have amazing messages and I just feel like I am the type of person who defines myself as spiritual. I define myself as someone who believes in a higher power but I'm not tied and labeled to a specific religion. At this time things could change whatever, but I'm just not super religious. I just wanted to clarify that before I get into the story because it's going to make a lot more sense. I was singing the song because I think it's a really good and powerful song with a powerful message. And I was so young. I just loved Carrie Underwood.

I was a Carrie Underwood fan. And I just liked her music. Bottom line, it was a Carrie Underwood fan and I just liked her music. Bottom line, it was a super simple reasoning behind why I wanted to sing the song. And I think it matched the tone of my voice and the vibe of my voice. And if you're a singer, if you're into music, you know that not every song really fits your tone of voice and your range and your register and all that stuff.

And this song really fit my range. So I was really excited and I auditioned with it and after the audition the people that were judging me were not Christian and I am not labeling myself as a Christian but technically I was raised Catholic whatever. The concept of religion did not even cross my mind as I was singing the song. It was just a song to me that I really liked. The people that were in charge of running this whole show were looking at each other like I had just sung some crazy ass inappropriate song.

Like they were looking at each other as if I committed a fucking crime. And it was so awkward because I Didn't know what I did wrong and they were like whispering to each other and giving me dirty looks and I was like What is going on? It's for all grown-ass adults like I was 13 years old maybe and they were in their 40s and they were grilling me and looking at me like I was fucking crazy so then I leave the audition room and and they were grilling me and looking at me like I was fucking crazy. So then I leave the audition room and they come back a few days later telling me that I am not allowed to sing a song that says the word Jesus in it.

Because most of my school was not Christian. Something weird like that, where it's not aligning with our religion, so we can't approve the song because other people in the audience might get offended. And I was like, how is this song by any means offensive, just because it says the word Jesus? Like, could I understand that it might not be everyone's religion? I do understand that, but at the same time, it's just a song. I don't think it's that big of a deal But they proceeded to tell me that I was not allowed to sing the song and it was going to make people too uncomfortable And I wasn't allowed to sing the song at the end of the day. I wasn't allowed to Sing the song and I wasn't allowed to say the word Jesus and it was weird because I went to a public school

It wasn't like I went to some super religious school that wasn't Christian. It was a public school where freedom of speech and freedom to say the word Jesus should not have been some crazy thing and it shouldn't have been a crime. But I was 13. You have to keep this in mind. I'm not 30 where I could have a mature conversation with these people and understand the meaning behind what they were saying. It was more just like this direct aggressive approach towards a child saying, you're not allowed to sing this because it's promoting Christianity in our school.

And I just started crying because all I heard was, you're not allowed to sing this. And they were treating me really badly throughout the process. They were treating me like I did something terribly wrong and it wasn't necessarily that I couldn't sing the song that really upset me and made me really traumatize. It was the way that they were treating me at such a young age. These grown adults were almost like telling me as a child that I wasn't welcome into the show just because of the song choice that I had made.

And they were threatening me in a really negative, weird way, and saying that if I didn't change the song that I wasn't going to be a part of the show. And it was the way that they were acting when I auditioned. I just vividly remember them creating me very weirdly and I didn't know what I did wrong and I was so innocent and I just liked the fucking song It was just a good song and it was a very popular song during that time period I don't think it would have offended anyone. It was playing all over the radio and Z100, like it was a very popular song. So I didn't understand if there was some crazy,

bad thing in the lyrics. I didn't know what happened. And as a young teenager who wasn't really understanding why I couldn't be a part of something, it just made me feel really, really shitty and scared and bad about myself because I felt like these adults were all mad at me and they weren't communicating to me in child-friendly terms of why I couldn't be a part of the show. And it was really weird. I

remember they made this huge deal out of it and like the whole school knew about it and the students were aware of what was going on and it was so uncomfortable for me. I was afraid of my fucking music teacher after that. It felt so awkward for me to go into class because I could tell that she just didn't want me to be a part of the show. Like she was mad because maybe I had said the word Jesus, I don't know, but it was just clear that I wasn't light and I wasn't accepted in that moment. And it's a weird story, but it's also something where I look back and I have a vivid memory

of just feeling so terrible as a young kid. And it's something that no one deserves to go through. You feel like you're being cornered and you don't know how to confront an adult because you're so young and you don't know how to confront an adult because you're so young and you don't know how to handle certain things because you're so young. And looking back like, yeah, I could laugh about it and it's funny and it's like whatever, it was middle school, I grew up and whatever, it's just a blip in time. But those memories really do leave a mark on you as an adult because if I can remember so vividly how

I felt in that moment, it definitely had left some sort of imprint on my brain and I've learned through feeling not accepted that the only thing you can do is really, really truly learn about who you are and be confident in that and as you get older and go through experiences like this, that's how you learn to become a really strong version of who you are. That's how you learn to become strong and empowered and have boundaries and stand your ground and learn how to stand up for yourself.

And it took me until I was 30, or really like 29 to 30, when I started to really understand how to create boundaries for myself and protect myself and stand up for myself because of something like that happened now and someone was discriminating against my beliefs and what I valued because I'm not religious and I don't have any problem with Christianity at all, but if I was religious and I did believe in a specific thing or someone talks about my beliefs now, whatever it is, if someone starts

shitting on my values and the person that I am and says you can't do this or you can't do that because of the way that you are, I just feel like at this point of my life I know how to stand up for myself and I know who I am and I know how strong I am and how much I've been through and how much shit I've tolerated and I'm like, fuck no, you're not gonna treat me like that and you're not gonna talk to me that way because that's on you to treat me like shit. I know I'm a good person, I know what I stand for and I'm allowed to be myself. It's 2023, what the fuck are you doing? And I know people who still go through shit like this on a daily basis

where they don't feel respected, they don't feel accepted, and they don't feel loved or valued by people around them. They feel judged, they feel embarrassed, they feel demeaned and degraded, and this can apply to so many different types of situations and experiences. No one wants to be put in a position like that, where they're constantly being judged and almost like it's just like a form of being degraded. Like it's a form of someone telling you your identity or something that you're doing isn't what other people stand for and you got to change who you are. And obviously if you're doing something that's harmful to other people if you're doing something that's putting other people's lives in danger,

Yeah, maybe you should check yourself because obviously it's understandable if people want to intervene about that if you're putting other people in life-threatening situations But that's the only situation where I can say that would make sense for people to have an intervention But if you're just shitting on someone's character or making them feel small or making them feel like they're doing something wrong, just because they're being themselves, you need to check yourself. That's fucked up. And I don't stand for that. And I think I've just been through so much where I've learned that you really got to protect your piece. And you really have to understand that your life is valuable and you are valuable and if you're a good-hearted person, no one should treat you like crap. No one should treat you like shit. If someone has the fucking nerve to do that, put them in their place,

say something. It really depends on the situation. Sometimes I will say something, sometimes I will walk away because it's not worth my energy or my fucking time. I'm like, you do you, you be a shitty person, I'm gonna do me because I know my intentions and I know my worth. And with that being said, I hope you enjoyed today's episode. It's a little bit of a different topic than usual, but I just truly have been through so much with people that have not seen my worth and have made me feel small. And I thought it was important to vocalize and talk about because I know people can relate to this and I know people have been through similar things. And if this episode can help you in any way

and make you feel like you're not alone, if you're currently going through something like this or whatever it is or you've been through something like this, I would love to hear your stories. You could always message me on Instagram, atlis or at date yourself instead. I love you. Thank you so much as always for listening to the podcast and stay tuned for the next one.