It’s impossible to have 100% consensus on anything, especially when it comes to other people’s opinion of what you are/are not doing.

It’s hard not to pay attention to things online, like Facebook or Twitter or whatever, when someone has bad things to say about you and what you are doing. I immediately go to the place of serious self-doubt and total loss of confidence. I start questioning every professional decision I have ever made and not sure about the program I put together for the next month. It’s incredible that after 20 years of doing what I do, I still feel so unsure and insecure that one negative comment can send me to that place.

The thing is, if you are doing something visibly, people will have an opinion about it and there is nothing you can do about that. And the more productive and successful you are, the louder the noise. I have seen it happen to cats I know and it has happened to me, as well. When it happens to others, it’s easy to have a healthy perspective and brush it off: one time, I sent one of my closest friends a t-shirt saying, “Haters Gonna Hate,” cause you know, they do.  He was really hurt by conjectures and assumptions and misunderstandings that were brewing on the World Wide Web. My friend’s success drew so much of the kind of attention he didn’t want. It was easy for me to say to him, “oh don’t worry about it. They are just jealous and insecure and they have no idea how hard you work.” Only if I can tell myself that. lol.