Many of us spend a lot of our time and life trying to figure out what other people think of us and say about us. It is why people take frivolous personality quizzes, run elaborate gossip rackets, read glossy magazines and even run for elections.

We want to look good in front of others, and we want to find out if the effort we put in everyday is paying off. It is a very strong urge.

It makes us feel good to be acknowledged and appreciated. It sometimes shatters us when we don’t get acknowledged. This is a major reason why people often allow others to make them happy or unhappy.

Almost every human being has to make a decision from time to time if they will let their actions be determined by approval and disapproval, appreciation and censure of other people. And it is a dillemma almost every time.

The pragmatic benefit of knowing what other people are thinking about you

There is a value in what people think of you and say about you. It reflects the perception of an entire community most of the time, to which the concerned person and you both belong. Your various communities (such as family, co-workers, neighbours, people of your town or village etc) often decide how effective you will be – in life, in profession, in pursuit of your dreams and passions.

This is why politicians have to carefully curate their public perception – perception of the community that matters to them – their voters. Similarly, lawyers, accountants, bankers and other such professionals also carefully tend to curate their image with their clients and are very careful to protect the same.

To pay attention to a community’s perception of you and taking it as a feedback can be a greatly beneficial exercise. This is why approval ratings for the US President exists. High approval ratings may mean that a President can push through a rather unpopular reform, so it is clearly an useful thing.

The mirage of public perception is a great distractor

We all know the wise fables that suggest that only fools try to please everyone. Trying to curate public perception often leads to frustrating attempts to please everyone,  which often make people very ineffective as leaders, executioners or ideologues. This could be a reason why politicians are rarely loved by the masses despite all their efforts to look good, and are even rarely effective.

What is popular is often not what is right, or what is most necessary.

Its not only politicians, even the most unremarkable people with no public interface are victim to this. Most people are absolutely protective of their self image. They will go to great extent to enhance and protect their public image, which in term buttresses their self-worth. In pursuit of public perception, sometimes which involves perception of just one individual who is present before you at the moment, people do things that they don’t want to do and worse, don’t do things they want to do.

For instance, there are many people out there who are unable to ask for the money they have lent to a friend, lest they are judged negatively. Many people fear to compete with others openly lest they lose the support of a group. Some people fear to excel because they are afraid that would mean earning jealousy and breaking ranks from their mediocre friends.

Trying to look good in front of others can be a dangerous pursuit, it can ruin even best of the people.

Why do superheroes wear masks? 

Quite a puzzle. Perhaps every human being who aspires to be a leader is faced with this dilemma that need to maintain a public perception throws up. Perhaps this is why many a superheroes are masked, or hide their real identity – to be free from the burden of appreciation and censure from masses that they don’t know, control or even understand.

What will you do? What do you already do in this area of your life?

How to get started

It is important to find out the brutal truth about what the communities in your life think about you. This gives us a great starting point. Once you know what a community thinks of you, its a great starting point to transformation of that perception.

However, what is sometimes counterintuitive and gets missed is that more important than you knowing is the event of the people from the community telling you without malice what they think of you, and you listening to it without reacting and creating a positive experience out of the whole thing.

It is important to create a space where the other person, who is from the same community, can really tell you what the community thinks of you, without feeling that you are going to judge him for holding that view, or that you will be negatively affected by the sharing. It takes emotional security on both side of the table to have an effective conversation of this nature. While listening, we must not start to explain ourselves or tell them why the views of the community are wrong or invalid. Good, patient hearing, coupled with fresh promises that are delivered as expected always transform such group-think, and the community may thereafter relate to you as a new person altogether.

Why people will not tell you what they think of you

It is not easy to find out what other people really say about you when you are not around, because those same people care about your appreciation and censure. If not yours, they care about appreciation and censure from people around them generally, just like you, and that is why it is difficult for them to tell you exactly what they think of you. It takes some amount of mastery to get them really talk to you openly about this subject. With practice and patience it becomes easier.

Why do people cook up stories about you?

While by default people are unwilling to talk about you on your face, sometimes even reluctant to acknowledge if not censure, they seem to be much happier talking about you behind your back! Isn’t that a mysterious contradiction? You hear people cooking up stories about you and your best friend and how you were found making out. And how the pigs fly and how the ants are of the size of an elephant.

Everyone who knows you is going to have an opinion about you. Many who have no clue about you are likely to have an even stronger opinion about you. Those who meet you would form their opinion of you based on what they felt or experienced. Many people who have never really got to know you, form their opinion about you based on others narratives. False but colourful narratives are often stronger and more attractive than truthful and boring ones.

People will judge you every minute and it’s up to you if you want to stand as a victim in their court.

It is always a good idea to use public perception as a tool for getting valuable feedback and to cultivate it so that your leadership is effective. However, it is just a tool, like many others. Connecting your self worth to it is a recipe for disaster.