Why do you take things personally? It’s because you can only see the world through your perspective.
In your mindset, you may be overestimating the opinion of others over your inner knowing. I like to explain this like a movie you create in your mind and live out in your life.
Everybody has a voice in their head. It’s constantly feeding the same storylines to you over and over again. It’s making you see the world the way your thoughts tell you it is based on the Storylines you keep constructing.
It’s like a movie you create in your mind every day, all day. It’s made up of thoughts and feelings you replay over and over regarding situations and people.
A quick example might be how you feel about the government controlling people in Covid-19. Over time you have built up a collection of complicated thoughts that generally come to the same conclusion(i.e. the government is good or bad). Some of those thoughts point to actual events, but most of it is assumptions and made up ideas to support your conclusion that government is good or bad. This is your movie plot.
You create the plot and subplot, and you also star in the film as the main character. The only character that matters in your brain is you. The film evolves around you, is written and acted by you , and is your life.
Thus in life, it's easy to think it’s personal and it’s not. We consider other people's opinions to be more important than our own. However, most people are too self-absorbed to care about you. They are busy starring in their own mental dramas.
People aren’t sitting around wondering about you or thinking about you. They may be vaguely curious about you, but you aren’t their primary focus. And you don’t want to be; it would be a lot of pressure. Other people aren’t sitting around wondering if it is happy or prosperous.
Also, people aren’t plotting against you or looking for ways to disadvantage you. They are just doing their best based on their circumstances and mental model. They have their mental movies to contend with.
People also don’t need you to make them happy. Even someone you marry doesn’t require you to be satisfied; we all instinctively know happiness is an inside job.
Happiness is interwoven in your life plot film, but inner joy is not dependent on anything. Happiness is a feeling inside you, not something you achieve through other people.
We may include other people in the made-up movie plots of our own life; however, you are still the main character. Everything revolves around you. You can only see the world through yourself.
People do make each other the object of their attention for a while. It means you can become a predominant player in someone else’s film. You are written in as a primary supporting character. Now regular plots involving you are added to their mental movie. In reality, you spend more time together and enjoy each other.
The film has been written that way in the mind of the perceiver.
Someone in your life makes you an essential part of their script. They write you in however they decide to perceive you. You're a hero or a villain.
If you are a hero, that person thinks good thoughts about you regularly, and in reality, you have good times together. If someone felt that you were a jerk, they would not spend time with you.
Think about your movie script for your life. It’s simply a collection of recurring thoughts that generally come to the same conclusion over and over again. It paints people and situations as good or ,wrong and you act on these assessments.
It’s like a movie plot you create and play out in real life.
The important part is to appreciate that you are the main character and direct the entire film. It’s all your perspective and storyline telling you how to act.
In other words, you're not acting on what’s happening in front of you; you are working on made-up scripts and storylines about what’s supposed to happen. Storylines are all constructed around you as the main character.
As the main character, your job is to protect yourself. To ensure your survival. Once the main character dies, the movie is over. Especially if you’re the director creating the film, your survival is critical. But only to you.
Sometimes the best thing you could do is collapse the film. Walk away. It's not real anyway. The only one who's even going to notice the movie was a flop is you. All your stress, drama and perceived problems are wrapped up in those storylines.
Some of it is real, but most of it is an assumption. It's made up so your main character can survive.
The Storylines are keeping you from experiencing your life. They are made up of assessments and assumptions about life. They prevent you from enjoying life.
Suppose you walk into every situation with a vague storyline about why you're there, how important or unimportant you are, what you need from people, and the experience. It all revolves around you; you can’t experience it.
You assess the experience and people and evaluate yourself in the background , but you're not experiencing it to the best you can.
You are thinking about your life instead of being in your life. You are a character in a movie happening outside yourself. You keep telling that character ( yourself) what’s good or bad, and you respond to that inner dialogue.
It would be a lot more rewarding to live in your real life. Immerse yourself in everything that happens to you through you.
Instead of assessing everything and rewriting internal plots -you live life directly.
This would mean you think about stuff a lot less and feel more into life. Instead of assessing and analysing life like an external movie plot, you get into life: you are not acting; you are living.
Like being in virtual reality vs. watching a character on a screen, you experience life happening at the moment. Instead of manipulating yourself as a character in a film through your internal assessments, you are the character.
I'm sure some of this makes sense , and some of it may seem confusing.
There is one steady way to know how well you experience your life. It’s through the way you feel each moment. When you feel good, time flies by; it means you are immersed in your life. You Bliss Out on Happiness in the present moment.
You are not assessing life as good or bad, but you're living it. You can’t enjoy something that you resist or dislike. It’s impossible.
You immerse yourself in the experience when you accept it and appreciate it entirely. You can relate to yourself and others within the expertise you are absorbed in and not absent from the experience.
You're not off making up another movie script in your mind, painting it as good or bad. Instead, you are inside your life and appreciating it as it unfolds.
Even when things happen you don’t like, you appreciate its value. When someone offers a differing opinion, you value the contrast. It helps clarify reality.
The more often you feel good, the more you know you're doing this life thing well. I’d call it the quality of life. It’s not the kind of life with requirements and expectations to prove quality. It’s not a goal you achieve. It’s a feeling inside you.
When you feel good, you appreciate your life. You're not starring in a made-up plot but living the real life around you.
Your life is far more beautiful than any script you could ever make up.
