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Dear Young La,

Why are you so obsessed with what someone else thinks of you? Why are you so taken with having “haters”?

Your obsession with being disliked, judged, hated on… is only a reflection of what is going on inside, girl. And you can’t face that internal truth, can you? You create all this movement in your life. Getting dressed up. Planning this event. Performing at that event. Raising money for this charity. Speaking on this panel. Stepping out to that night spot with your girlfriends. But you’re making the classic error of mistaking movement for achievement. Sure, you do a lot. But none of it fulfills you and in an effort to feel better about your empty pursuits, you create yourself some “haters,” these mythical beings who supposedly can’t stand how well you’re doing and go out of their way to be vocal about it.

Let me put you on to something, sis: All the imaginary haters, naysayers and judgmental folks you’ve created – it’s all just a reflection of what’s going on inside you. You’re empty. You’re searching. You don’t feel fulfilled regardless of how much you do. So, you’ve created a false reality of hateration, as Mary would call it.

Truth moment? Folks aren’t thinking about you half as much as you’ve made yourself believe. You and your girlfriends put yourselves on pedestals claiming everyone hates you for your success when in reality if they even think about you, they dislike you because you’re mean. You’re mean because you’re not fulfilled. You’re not fulfilled because you’re a Grade A, first class narcissist.

Narcissism is real in your life. You take yourself entirely too seriously. You’ve traded self-reflection and humility for false pride and empty movement. Question: Why do you feel as though most people, if not everyone hates you and is judging you? Answer: Because what you choose to see and focus on, on the outside is a reflection of what’s going on inside. You’re unhappy. You’re not proud of where you are. There is an emptiness you’re too scared to fill by really stepping out on faith and walking in your purpose. No. The façade looks good enough. It’s safe. You put on a good show for the masses. You do a LOT, but the substance is lacking. You’re fearful that everyone else can see exactly what you feel inside so you lash out. You twist constructive criticism into “hate” and wise counsel into “judgment” because that’s essentially how YOU feel about yourself.

Look around you, love. Observe those who are really walking in their purpose. They are too busy living life as freely as possible to worry what others think of them. The most successful and fulfilled people you know are too busy moving forward to even acknowledge words like “haters.” Their measure of humility is not lacking. Their ability to meet and exceed life goals and missions is inspiring. They see what is happening around them but they do not let it deter them from where they are headed. They have no desire to play themselves up, toot their own horn, or list their accomplishments as society tells us we must do to get ahead. Their gifts make room for them. And their haters? If they exist, they’re non-factors. So do yourself a favor and get over yourself. You won’t regret it.

With love from 2013,

Grown La

La Truly’s writing is powered by a lifetime of anecdotal proof that awkward can transform to awesome and fear can cast its crown before courage. La writes to encourage thought, discussion and positive change among young women through her writing. Follow her on Twitter: @AshleyLaTruly.

I’m a very nice and upfront person.  I don’t like to play those games of “I’m mad at you, and even if you guess why I’m mad at you I’m not going to tell you because you should already know.”  I feel like that type of behavior is garbage (and sorry for anyone who plays that game and you’re offended…).  But, I’m too much of a happy person to ever really get mad at people or stay mad for too long.  The problem that I have sometimes is that I assume that people are like me.  That if they’re mad, they’re going to either address it or find a way to deal with it.  However, some people just aren’t like that.

Let me take you back to my senior year of high school, when Nelly, Lil Jon and the Ying Yang Twins were blowing up all types of music charts and I had an unknown frenemy.  This girl, off and on, would act like she had a problem with me.  I would be nice, try to ignore it, think that I was being too sensitive, but when the craziness got too much, I would ask:  ”Hey, what’s wrong?  Are you mad at me?”  She would always tell me no, that [insert someone else's name] made her upset and she was just thinking about them and she didn’t realize that she was taking it out on me.  That’s why I didn’t realize she was a frenemey until after we both graduated high school and went off to our separate colleges.

Running into her the next summer after our freshman year, she was being extremely rude.  But, I’d forgotten about her foolishness, so her behavior wasn’t so easy for me to brush off this time.  Sending her an impassioned Facebook message I asked her what was wrong, why had she been so rude, what did I do and the so forth.  After a day she sent me back a message detailing incident after incident where I had made her upset and all I could think of (besides the fact that she had a LOT of misconceived information, but whatever) were all of the times that I approached her during those times, asked her if I did anything and she would adamantly say “No!  You didn’t do anything!  I swear!”

Because of that, I’ve become kind of paranoid with certain people.  Not really with my friends or coworkers, but the few people who, when I ask them “What’s wrong?”  and they say nothing, I immediately think:  ”LIAR!  They’re mad at me!”  Then my mind frantically starts searching for times that I might have offended/angered them.

You know the story of Narcissus, right?  Based off of a Greek myth, he was a young man that was so consumed with his own image that while mentally drinking in his reflection in a pool of water (because mirrors hadn’t been invented yet) he fell in and drowned.  Most Greek myths were written as cautionary tales to warn people of dastardly results from crazy actions, and his fatal actions are where we get the term narcissism.

In this day and age of digital narcissism, where we broadcast everything we do and expect people to care, has made people unintentionally narcissistic.  Now, I’m not knocking it.  I have a Twitter account, and it does sting a little when I notice I’ve lost a couple of followers. (Nothing that a nice cry in the shower won’t fix. Just kidding.) But because of these actions I feel as if our society has became just a little bit sensitive. Sometimes, we need to remind ourselves that it’s really not about us.

When someone seems crestfallen in our presence, they could be thinking about mortgage payments, crazy coworkers, or global warming (people are still worried about that, right?) instead of thinking about us.

Now, don’t get me wrong, sometimes we are the problem (and I had a Facebook message to prove it), but not everyone is as crazy as *Melissa was (*name changed).  If you did do something wrong, then do your own version of damage control, but if they tell you you didn’t, don’t obsess about trying to figure out what you did.  That’s a deep pool that you’re wading in, and if you’re not careful you can end up drowning.

Swim away from your narcissistic fears and to Kendra Koger’s twitter account @kkoger.

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