When people want to tell us ‘who we are’, it’s good to self-reflect and to consider what they have to say. However, their perspective is based on their experience of us, the world and also themselves. Ultimately, they must be heard through the filter of your self-esteem.

That is resilience.

I was talking to a friend who has recently become successful with a project. She said she was receiving micro-aggressions from other women. If you’ve never heard the term micro-aggressions, they are snide comments, too small for you to react to. They can often go unnoticed and only add up to someone putting you down when you collect them all together. To react to them as an individual comment you would be seen as being ‘sensitive’ or get told ‘I was only joking’ but you can feel the intent behind them and it can be hurtful.

My friend said she needed to become more robust. 

When she said the word robust I visualised a rubber mat over her heart, and that she was a silver robot, but a more modern-day cyberman, not one with a silver bucket on its head (It’s a Dr Who thing!).
She wanted to be a ‘rise above it’ person and not be reactive. It’s interesting how this is classed as ‘being professional’, but it comes with a cost!

Most people who act from a place of jealousy, or wish to bring you down with some ugly inaccurate truth, don’t want what you’ve got. That is a misconception about jealousy. The fact you are living your dream or living full out, boxing at life with the gloves off, reflects badly on them if they are not engaging with life in the same way. So they feel the need to ‘devalue you’ to raise their value in their perceptions, not in reality.

If you don’t have a sense of who you are with fundamental self-esteem, you might listen to them. The micro-aggression Parana nips can leave you being a bag of bones.

Jealousy can bring you down when you’re living at altitude.

If you have found yourself in this situation, I offer you this internal thought statement of resilience:

“Thank you for your opinion, but you have no idea of the journey it took for me to get where I am today, I’m the driver of my own life, I’ve got this covered (with the optional – now, do one you peace of sh*t)

If someone is trying to bring you down, take it as a compliment, as they wouldn’t be hanging onto your ankles if you weren’t flying high.

And one last thing, the people who need the most support are not always the ones struggling, everyone loves them, as they challenge no one. The ones living outside of their comfort zone, and building a new path, are the ones who are the brave. Support them with encouragement when you find them, these are the game changers of the world.