Blocking Outside Opinions

Welcome to Business And, the podcast for people making it all happen. Running a successful business completely takes over your life, but I'm a believer that there is still room for some ants, like health, wealth, beauty, and maybe even some fashion. On this podcast, I'll share with you what's working for scaling my nine-figure business while keeping you up to date on the latest trends, news, and fun finds. This is a place for business and let's dive in. Welcome back to Business and Business Cool to think about not caring what other people think about you. How great would that be? You just wake up every day, doing exactly what you want to do, when you want to do it, because only you care about what you think about your decisions. And, you know, it's something I don't talk about too often, because it's not really popular to talk about, but, you know, here we are in the podcast, and you'd get the little insight into my brain on certain things like this. I find it really fascinating myself to work as hard as I do, because I actually don't have to do this. I'm actually sitting here on a Saturday afternoon. It's 5/21. I had hair and makeup come over to my house at 7 a.m. I'll be up at 6 tomorrow morning to be at work all day, and I will do that all throughout the next handful of weeks, and that's how I've run my life for many, many years now. And it's just interesting to me, because whenever I get overwhelmed or feel like, ah, I freaking hate this, I literally remind myself that I'm choosing to do this. And when you have a certain level of financial success, it's interesting, because you can either choose to stop working altogether, at which point you will lose purpose, and I just know from experienced life will actually feel worse and bleaker and darker. Or you can just go all in and what you actually believe you can create what your actual potential is, and I'm at that stage of my career where I don't have to work the way that I work, but I work more than anybody who has to work, because I actually enjoy what I do, and it's so important for me, not to care what anybody else thinks of me, but for me to care what I think of me. And it matters to me how I show up. It matters to me how I prepare for things or how intense I am with situations, because it's a representation to me of what is possible, and I get to either increase my own confidence in myself, or reduce my confidence in myself every single day. And it's only to this place, because I don't actually care what others think. It is not a game for me about other people. It is only a game for me about what I think. So here in this podcast, I'm going to go over the five strategies that have helped me, who used to be very worried about judgment, and break through all those limitations to be in a position now where I care about what I think. And you might end up working in harder than you think you need to, but I can promise you that it ends up actually working out exactly the way that you want it to. So with that, I hope you enjoy. If you want to live a powerful and fulfilled life, the first thing you need to do is stop carrying what other people think of you. And here's the truth. When you focus on yourself, everything else is just noise. I used to be so consumed with what other people thought and what they said about me, and it just kept me broke and stuck. But since I stopped carrying, I've become a successful business owner, living my dream life, and I am the most confident that I've ever been. So these are the five strategies that will help you break free from judgment and criticism and give you the power to change your life. Let's get started. First up is to use the criticism as fuel. You see, for the last 10 years, anytime someone has said something negative about me, I just reframe it to use as fuel for me to get up earlier, work out harder, answer the emails, figure out how to take that and convert it into motivation to get me to do things that I don't want to do. You see, I weaponize the criticism. I make it work for my benefit. So when you think about the criticism that you receive, it might be a side comment from a friend who says, oh, you know, I don't think you're going to be that successful. Most businesses fail. You use that as fuel, because sure, it might be true that most businesses do fail in the first 10 years, but not your business. Some people say things to you that cause you to stop, slow down, get frustrated, doubt yourself, convert it instantly. It's like your hack. Instead of letting it introvert you, it becomes the thing that you use to step up your game. It's the thing that you use to work harder so that you can prove that person wrong. You see, people are motivated by all sorts of different things. Sometimes you're motivated by the dream life, what it could be like for you to hit your goals, and you live in fairy tale land. That can use this motivation for sure. It's funny, I was just talking last night to a girl on my team who read me some text messages that an ex employee of ours center, and he was a complete asshole to her. He's working relationship initially, but when he left, he sent her a slew of text messages saying, you aren't like the old you, you used to be a nice person. You're never going to get to where you're trying to go. Nobody likes you. And you start using all of these generalities because he got let go because he wasn't doing what he was supposed to be doing because he is going to not have a great career in the future. I think that and throw it all on her and she told me about this a handful of days after it happened. I wish you would have told me the moment that it happened because I would have told her do not lose an ounce of sleep thinking about this guy. Do not even for a moment question who you are and what you're capable of because of this guy. Use this to work harder but don't allow it to sink in and have you doubt yourself because of it. Just use it to prove that person wrong and be so confident that you will prove that person wrong because there's no chance that they are going to be right. You're not going to let them be right. You can play this balance very easily. You don't succumb. You don't take a step back. You take it and you just add it as this additional thing that's helping you get to where you're trying to go. There's nothing that has been more helpful to me than being crystal clear on my mission, my vision and my core values and I have a framework that is super helpful and being able to create these. So if you want it, go to my Instagram @natalydawson and DM me the word vision and I'll send it your way. My second strategy is that it is okay to care. The fact is no stranger trolling me or hate or online will ever be more disappointed in me than I could be in me. I know that if I'm my own worst critic, the criticisms of others don't matter much. But here's the thing. I do care about a certain subset of people and what they think about me really does matter because I want to impress them. I want them to be proud of me. It would be because the person that they would be impressed by would have to have accomplished things. They would have to be an impressive person, not by some silly standard, but by a standard that matters. If the person is impressive and they're impressed, that means that I did something and I created something that was worthwhile. It helped people. It made an impact. And so people who have made an impact, to me, they do matter what they think about me. But people who have never made an impact, who are just spectators online, who are scared trolls, who think that it's just the greatest gift to be able to anonymously hate on people, I could give two shits what they think about me. But it's not just the haters because most people to be honest with you don't even know you. You haven't made a big enough impact for anybody to even say anything about you. So it's actually a gift when you have haters or people who are saying negative things about you because that at least means that you've done something. I think the hardest part is figuring out those people who are not overly supportive. They're not necessarily haters. They just aren't supporting you. They aren't commenting on your post. They aren't sharing your content like a stranger who might be supporting your business or who is a new customer of yours. And those are the relationships that are the most challenging because you have to stop carrying what they think about you. Your friends from high school or college, maybe the golf club, who are good with where they're at and aren't pursuing a goal that gets them excited, it really shouldn't matter what they think about you or how they don't support you. Because what you have to think with is who is the person out there that needs me to help them. Your friends from high school probably don't need you to help them, but there are somebody out there that you can provide value to, that you can contribute positively to. But if you get stuck in the judgment of your high school friends or your college friends or your golf buddies, of course you're just going to succumb to, well, maybe I don't really need to make that big of an impact. You can watch this, especially with the guys that I work around. Some other guys that they're friends with will start making fun of them when they start to post online because they think that they're too good for them or they think that they're Mr. Hot Shop because they're posting about their workout routine. And it's really unfortunate for me to watch because they might all be making good money. They might be making a couple hundred grand a year fairly successful, but not satisfied. They're disappointed with where they're at. They want to make a million dollars a year or two million dollars a year, but the people that they spend time around are happy and content with where they're at. So instead of being supportive, they make little comments that put the person down and that suggests that whatever the goals of that person are just aren't worthwhile to pursue. And then the person becomes introverted. Those are the people you actually have to worry about because most people aren't going to be outright haters. They're going to subtly hate on you. They're going to subtly not support you. And when that happens, you convert their judgment into action and going after your goals relentlessly because you can recognize that they aren't going after their goals. You're going after your goals and that's what's making them uncomfortable. Whatever people say about you truly is just noise and it is okay to care about what certain people think, but remember to care more about what you think about you. Next is number three. Recognize when it's time to cut people off. When I first started my Instagram, I couldn't look at the comments. I refused to look at anybody who is watching my stories, any of my content I didn't want to know. I wouldn't even check to see if my high school or college friends were paying attention to my posts. Because in my mind, I wasn't talking to them. I was talking to somebody who I could actually help. And if I knew that they were watching and they weren't commenting and they weren't sharing that I would feel introverted. So instead, I just shut it all off. Literally hitting the mute button allowed me to focus on becoming the person who I wanted to be and communicating with the people who I wanted to make an impact on. You see, I wouldn't be able to grow a YouTube channel like this if I thought that I was talking to my friends from the past. Because my friends from the past wouldn't have supported me talking about this. They'd be like, "Oh, that's so silly." Or you really think that you're all that? Well, yeah, I guess I kind of do think that I'm all that. I think that I work really hard in order to create an impact and to help people and to solve very specific problems so that I could be able to share them with others. I can actually have the responsibility of being able to tell people, "Don't do this. It's going to make your life harder. Do this so that you can make more money." Focus on this in your business so that you can actually scale and I do think highly enough of myself that I should set that standard for my life and then use that standard to help other people get ahead faster and do it more significantly. And not have to take slow routes or de-tours because they get distracted and they're listening to the wrong people. But if you don't cut that off, you risk giving up on the goal because of the infiltration of their lack of support. Cutting people off will give you a singular focus. And remember that other people's thoughts and opinions are entirely unnecessary. When people in your life judge you for what you're doing and they say that it's cringy, remember that you actually don't have to listen to them. This next strategy is my favorite. It is asking the simple question, "So what?" I can't just assume that you have made perfect decisions up into this point of your life. And maybe there are some things in your life that you've done that you are embarrassed by, that you don't want people to find out about, and that actually holds you back from being able to reach for what you're trying to go. And whenever I have these limiting thoughts where I've been a bad leader, where I've made the wrong decision, where I've been embarrassed by the way that I showed up, I remind myself, "So what?" It doesn't matter that you made a mistake a year ago or five years ago or yesterday, that has no bearing on what you are going to do right now. If you can give yourself grace and you can accept yourself for where you're at right now with every single decision that you've made up until this point, you will have the strength to easily cut people out who don't allow you to shift and pivot into the person that you want to become. Oftentimes, it actually does start with you being okay with yourself, with you coming to terms with the bad decisions or the bad choices that you've made. And the way that you do that is by simply asking yourself this question, "So what? Why does it matter? And who does it matter to?" And if you've done something that is just so terrible, go to the person that you've done this too and apologize, make it right so that you can move into this next area of your life, this next phase of your life, and feel strong in what you're doing. And there's no better example of this than Donald Trump. Could you imagine if Donald Trump at some point in his life would have said, "Well, I've made too many bad mistakes, done too many bad deals, had too many incriminating conversations for me to be able to become the president of the United States." I couldn't possibly do that. Well, he did all of those things and maybe had some dicey behavior in his past and still became the president of the United States of America, despite the fact that he had many decades of life and very colorful life that he lived. So when I think about the fact that Donald Trump became president, whether you voted for him or not, it's an interesting case study to just remember, so what? You can have screwed people over, have a complete career change, entirely strip your old identities from who you are because you get to decide what your future looks like and when you feel stuck late at night because you're worried about something coming out or some issue that you've created for yourself from the past. No better question to ask yourself than, "So what? It doesn't matter. If you can be okay with it yourself, you can then allow other people to move forward into your next chapter with you." And if they're unwilling to do that, they have no place in your life. Last is strategy number five. You have to have a clear visual of your future. I think that when you get a really clear picture of what you want to do and what you want to accomplish in life, you end up realizing that worrying over what other people will think will never help you get to where you're trying to go. In my experience, I found that craving the attention of others will only set you up for failure because you're making decisions off of what they want or what you think that they want. But really all that matters is what do you want and where are you trying to go? People who thrive off of positive attention, they tend to be impacted most by the negative attention. You see, I try not to get too high on either side. I'm not going to get super excited about people loving me, but I'm also not going to be upset when people are critical. Don't go too far in either direction. Be confident in the way that you show up. Be confident in the way that you can communicate. Be certain of your ideas and the exploration of your ideas and how you're perceiving the world and how you're perceiving business opportunities and people that you spend time with. Be interested. Be curious. But as you get more certainty in where you're going, it doesn't really matter if people are praising you or people are criticizing you because your self-worth is driven off of your decisions. And the way that you see the world. So never hedge your self-worth on if people like you or if they don't because it really can change day by day. We're seeing this right now with Drake. Everybody hated Drake in early 2025. There was pandemonium about how awful Drake was and the lies and the criticism that was coming out from all sorts of people who were his friends, who were in the industry, his fans. And then all of a sudden, six months later, he releases a new album and nobody seems to remember all of the points inside the feud. You see, I have a feeling that he doesn't take it too seriously when people love him more when people hate him. He just decides to make great music that people end up enjoying, but ultimately that he ends up enjoying. So focus on your craft and who you are becoming and let everything else entirely fade away. Don't let the negative criticism get you rattled. There are highs and lows of every situation and if you just stay focused on you and the future that you visualized, all the other stuff is really just noise. If you like this video and want to take the next step to becoming the most confident version of yourself. 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