Maybe you’re overweight and other girls teased you. Or maybe it was that you’re uncoordinated. Or was it your hair, or shoes or the clothes your parents bought? Maybe it was what you ate, an accent, or a nose, or ears or your teeth? Maybe you were Polish or maybe you were from Ghana or Ecuador. Maybe you were even really pretty and they hated you for that. And let’s not forget the most important stuff: all of the many, many things you’ve said and done that you truly wish had never happened. Bottom line, no matter how you live, everyone 
gets hated.
That in and of itself is an unpleasant experience that reminds us that belonging to a tribe is important to our well-being and so by being an unpleasant experience, being hated reminds us that it is generally better to make friends. With connections comes peace and security and joy and love. But we mustn’t go so far as to suggest that there’s something wrong if you’re disliked or even hated. As I’ve noted before, there’s people that hate the Dalai Lama and Gandhi was shot. Hated is just part of the deal. And the more you’re you, the more connected you will be to most people, but you will also grow quite unlikeable to others.
It is challenging for egos to love healthy souls. A healthy person isn’t worried about any judgments and so they’ll do things that egos think they shouldn’t. The people living in ego will define them as bad or wrong, but the healthy person won’t be upset about being judged. They understand that the other people have been taught to expect others to perform, not to be people that are free. Egos want to be liked, they’re not trying to be their true selves. The healthy people know how easy it is to do that because they used to make the same silly, simple mistake. It’s so simple that it’s very difficult to even notice you’re making it. But you really don’t have to be liked by everyone. No one is, no one can be, and it’s way more enjoyable and helpful if you’re not. Then you can be you instead. Because you add zero creativity to the world if you’re busy performing some acceptable character when you could be busy creating things from your own unique perspective.
Be like a healthy person. They’ll be focused on what feels good, and experience has shown them that warmth, generosity and forgiveness lead to the very best feelings. So they’ll be pointed that way—not to impress anyone. It’ll be entirely selfish. They do it because it feels awesome. And they can do it wholeheartedly because they aren’t encumbered by wanting things to be different. They don’t have to endlessly adapt to different situations. Healthy 
people just move through life by being consistently themselves, no matter who they are in front of.
So right now you wish people knew the whole story. You wish they could see behind the scenes or that they knew how bad you really felt about the thing they’re angry at. Maybe you were slandered or libelled or just regret something super-duper stupid you did. Maybe you didn’t even do the thing they think you did and it’s all just a misunderstanding—but however it comes about, everyone else has all of that stuff too and it still doesn’t make you or them faulty, bad, worthless or unlovable. You can drop that story. You can halt that campaign. You can stop living your life in the shadow of whatever it is. Because everyone has multiple shadows. Even the happy people. So don’t let the shadows make you think you’re not qualified for love-ability. You totally are. By birth. That’s just how it is. The universe had to literally organize trillions and trillions of atoms to build you. You’re here on purpose.
Okay? So fewer I’m not worthy stories. Less beating yourself up. And then you don’t have to run others down either because you only do that out of insecurity. Otherwise you’re generous. You’re wonderful. You’re a beautiful soul. So shine on you crazy diamond. Let us see the light inside you. It’ll blind some and they’ll complain, but the rest of us will see you as a shining star.
Love you. Big hugs.
peace. s
A serious childhood brain injury lead Scott to spend his entire life meditating on the concepts of thought, consciousness, reality and identity. It made others as strange to him as he was to them. When he realized people were confused by their own over-thinking, Scott began teaching others to understand reality. He is currently CBC Radio Active’s Wellness Columnist, as well as a writer, speaker and mindfulness instructor based in Edmonton, AB where he still finds it strange to write about himself in the third person.