A. Chapters 2-3, Acceptance

You know that guy or girl who goes out of their way to tell you, and others, that you are nothing? It is like their life mission is to bring you down, and make sure you do not feel good about yourself. They are motivated by a fear that people will continue liking you, or looking up to you; God forbid they fail in their “noble” pursuit. If you have encountered more than one of these “righteously” angry or hateful people, you might have picked up an interesting fact; most haters have low self-confidence. By putting you down, they feel lifted up. In The Church and The Community, Page 22, I wrote about Dr. Sherwin K., an atheist, secular Jew who loathed seeing Messianic Jews succeed in leading a public Chanukah Lighting. Our win was a loss or affront to him, and he made sure to lash out at us more than once. Do not let anyone with low self-confidence or self-esteem, bring down yours down. You earned it.

Long gone are the days of “if you do not have something nice to say, do not say anything at all.” Especially if the “perpetrator” is not doing anything to you, is it really necessary to write letters to the editor filled with your disdain, or build an entire website to hold all of your negative thoughts and feelings? Sadly, for some people, if they do not have something nice to say they feel it needs to be said to the whole world, but if you are the subject of such negative attention, know that you can positively use it for your advantage. In The Church and The Community, Page 39, I wrote about how what was purposed as a public relations barrage, ended up increasing awareness and sensitivity for our beliefs. So the next time someone does not have anything nice to say, and then says it publicly, know that “any news is good news”, and you can positively use it to increase exposure of your product or service.

Compliments of the copious amounts of resources scattered about the internet, anyone can become well read (or video watched), on any topic. And this is good, until the person proclaims themselves a subject matter expert and makes it their personal duty to provide unsolicited feedback. Maybe you have met this person… the well meaning guy or gal who’s constant feedback quickly becomes criticism. It will not end until everything is their way. There is also those who are curmudgeon, a hater, or someone who does not recognize different people do things differently. I wrote about my will being broken by a critic (TCATC, Page 26), and I learned a big lesson in the process. Critics and Haters can not do it better, so thank them for their feedback, then get back to doing what YOU do best, the way YOU do it.