As much as I detest WhatsApp statuses, I’ve actually learnt quite a lot from reading people’s thoughts on there. It makes for a simple medium to share thoughts without much of a hassle. I selectively view statuses and I’m almost always happy with those I choose.
Today’s post was inspired by the status updates of two people on my contact list. Both of them are complete strangers to each other having just me as their mutual contact, but they managed to post something similar on their statuses within hours of each other. I decided to share some of my reflections based on their posts.
The main point of both posts is avoiding ‘riding on the praises of people.’
The posts caught my attention because I realized that I sometimes did just that, ride on the praises of people, even when I know deep down that some are not as true as stated.
As one of the posters said, sometimes, it’s people’s belief in us (through their comments about who they think you are) that give us that extra push to be more. Still, it is imperative that we recognize who we really are and dissociate it from who people think we are so that we can get from we are now to where we hope to be.
One example of living for people’s praises is evident on social media platforms these days, where a lot of us post things on social media and get engagements (likes/retweets/comments; it’s so easy to lose yourself in this and begin to do things solely for the approval of others. I am relatively active on twitter and this is a trend I see almost every time I log into my account.
The thing about doing things for the approval of others is that, you basically imprison yourself and are no longer free to be truly you based on the fear of losing your following. Also, humans can be fickle, the same people who rooted for you and made you do certain things are the ones that can turn on you and begin to criticize you when things don’t go well.
Sometimes, it can be hard to look deeply and assess yourself, devoid of people’s praises but that is something we should do more regularly, in other to truly truly be our best selves.
I’m learning to do what I stated above and I hope you will too.
xOxO,
Sisikunmi
