A short YouTube episode by Dr. Aziz (host of The Art of Extraordinary Confidence) teaching how to overcome the fear of what others think. Main points: there is "no hive mind" — people react differently rather than sharing a single judgment; much of the worry is projection of one's own negative self-judgments onto others; practical steps include noticing/catching the "they all think" thought, shifting self-perception with compassion and coaching, and practicing optimal self-coaching. The video also promotes Dr. Aziz's product, the Confidence Code, and invites viewer comments and further episodes.
Chapters
Have you ever held yourself back from doing something that was really important to you, something that you wanted to do that would have brought value to your life, like speaking up more in meetings or doing something for your business or increasing your sales or approaching that beautiful woman that you wanted to start a conversation with, something that you wanted to do, but you held yourself back because of what other people might think about what they might think. And if so, keep watching this episode because you're going to discover how to break through that BS fear once and for all. Welcome to the Art of Extraordinary Confidence, the show for men who want to 10x their confidence in any area of life that matters. Business, sales, public speaking, dating and relationships. Your social life anywhere. I'm your host, Dr. Aziz. And today we're going to be diving into that fear of what do they think? I've done a lot of research on this and polled a lot of people, and that's one of the biggest obstacles, one of the biggest forces that keeps us from having the confidence to go after what we want in life, whether it's for business and sales and increasing our income, or just our personal life or social life or friendships, dating and relationships. It's what are they going to think of me? And I want to teach you something that I just was doing with a client yesterday, actually, that's going to help you break free of this. So here's what it is. There is no hive mind. That's the distinction that I want you to get from this video. There is no hive mind. And what happens is we're in a situation, and let's say it's a meeting, and you're going to speak up and you're going to share something, whether you're leading the meeting or you're a participant in the meeting, and you're gonna speak up and share something. But then you don't. Or maybe you do, but then afterwards you're like, oh, I don't think that was very good. And then what happens is your mind says, well, they think, you know, everyone there thinks that I sounded stupid. Everyone there thinks that I don't know what I'm talking about. Everyone thinks that I'm not a good leader. Everyone thinks this, right? Our mind goes there almost instantly. And if you slow down and look at it, your mind is saying, they all think blank. And it lumps everyone. Whether the meeting or the presentation, whatever you were doing was three people or 300 people, they all think blank. And it's this oversimplification where it's like, we assume people have this hive mind like they're. Have you seen Ender's Game? The sci fi movie was a phenomenal book, by the way. Book is way better. Check that out. Ender's Game. Anyway, there's the alien species. They have these hive minds where it's like this queen that's kind of controlling all of her appendages, which are these little bugs. What are they called? Fornix. So that's how we think other people are. It's like they all share this brain, and so they all. The reality is there is no they. Everyone doesn't look at you the same way. So one person thought your presentation sucked. One person was checked out because they were thinking about their family or their mortgage. One person was engaged. One person was curious about the result. One person wanted to buy, one person didn't. You know, so it's this really kind of complex, varied response to whatever it is that you're doing. And that's the reality of it. Because think about that. I mean, we're all so different, and no two people are the same. So no two people are going to have the same reaction to you in your presentation. So the first thing you have to realize is when you're noticing that, oh, my God, they're thinking this, you got to catch it. Because that pattern is so ingrained in us that it just can go underneath the radar. And the next thing you know, you're feeling embarrassed or ashamed if it's already happened, or you're feeling fear and you're worried about speaking up, so you're kind of holding your, oh, my God, how's this going to go When. When you notice that, see what they are thinking in your mind? What are they thinking? And catch it, say, hey, there is no hive mind. And then here's one other step you want to take it even further is anytime we're saying they all think blank, we know it's not true. Right? Because no one thinks. Everyone doesn't think the same. Guess who thinks that. Guess who really thinks that. You do. It's what's called projection, clinical psychology. So projection is you take what you have, a judgment that you have in your mind, and you put it on someone else and imagine they're thinking it of you. So let's say you think that you're not a very good speaker or a presenter for your sales or for your company in your business. Then what happens is you're going to get into a meeting and then you say, oh, they all thought this about me. But the reality is you think that about you. And this goes down to I'm not a good speaker, I'm not an attractive guy, I'm not capable of making money. I don't, I'm not intelligent. Whatever it is that the, the limiting beliefs, the negative identity that you have for yourself, that's what you'll imagine they are thinking about you. And that's the best news in the world because then you're going to stop trying to manage what everyone thinks about you as if you can really kind of control everyone's perceptions of you, which you'd be surprised how much of the time people try to do that. But it's a losing game. You got to look at how do I look at me, how do I look at me and how do I shift that? How do I get on my own side? First of all, how do I acknowledge how great I am in all these different ways? And then on top of that, the areas that I want to work on, how do I approach that with compassion and support for myself and top quality coaching of myself. Like, hey, yeah, okay, that needs work. Let me work on that versus oh my God, that was terrible. I'm awful, right? So you're going to want to learn how to shift that. And if you really want to take this to the next level, you got to check out my product, the confidence code, because there's a whole section in there on optimal self coaching and we're going to dive into looking at those ways that you talk to yourself that are really toxic. So that's a way to take things to the next level in my product of confidence Code. But the key thing here is to take away that there is no hive mind and that you can look at your own perception of yourself and work on that and that will start to dissolve a lot of those fears. So I'm curious about what are the thoughts that are holding you back about what they might think. So share your comments below, ask your questions. The best stuff happens after the episode. I'd love to see what, what people say and dive into that conversation. So leave your comments below and also check out other episodes of the show to keep watching, to keep learning, keep growing in your confidence because the more you focus on this stuff, the more you pay attention, the more you learn, the more your life will transform. So I look forward to speaking with you inside of future episodes and until we speak again, may you have the courage to be who you are and to know that you're awesome.
