Should You Care What Other People Think?

That is an interesting question.

If I were to run a Twitter poll on this, 90% of people would say no—you shouldn’t care what people think. Everyone likes to say that they don’t care what other people think. But I can say one thing for sure—those 90% of people for sure care what other people think. The other 10% are at least honest about it.

It is pretty much impossible not to care what other people think of you. We are all essentially grown children, and we crave approval from others, especially if we didn’t get it from our parents. I remember in 2011, during the publicity tour for STREET FREAK, when a journalist from the FT did a hit piece on me. I was reading, for the first time, mean things said about me on the Internet. I couldn’t breathe for about two hours. A lot more mean things have been said about me since then, and today, it has no effect on me. I’ve learned more about that journalist over the years, and I’ve learned that she doesn’t have has much credibility as I thought. And everything happens for a reason. I’m thankful for what happened, because it made me who I am today. Most people will never have this experience of someone shitting on you online, and they will never understand what it is like. People have been driven to suicide by internet mobs. It’s a real thing.

So, how do you not care what others think of you? Like anything else in life, it takes work and practice. Speaking of STREET FREAK, my Amazon reviews for that book were mostly very good. But there were a few malcontents. One guy called me an “incompetent bumpkin,” among other things. Publishing a book is like no other experience in the world. You work for two years on this thing, you pour your heart out onto the page, in my case on deeply personal subject matter, then Rando Calrissian gets to take a giant dump on it on Amazon for everyone to see. And all authors read their Amazon reviews. All authors. Any book that has less than about 1,000 reviews, the author has read every single one of them. If you really want to fuck with an author, leave a scathing review on the Amazon page. He will read it, and it will ruin his day. The only solution to this is to never go to the Amazon page. But you want to see how the book is doing, right? You want to see the sales rank, right?

I’m going to channel Nassim Taleb here and say that the solution is to be antifragile. You might be surprised to know how many people out there won’t do or write things because people might say mean stuff about them online. They live in fear of the trolls. Say what you will about Peter Schiff—I think he is a doorknob of an investor, but that guy is antifragile. He literally does not care what you think of him. He’s been ratioed up the wazoo a whole bunch of times. Keeps coming back for more. You have to wonder if he actually has a perverse desire for that sort of attention. I have my own character flaws, but living in fear of trolls is not one of them. I think it was the Guardian that did a piece on internet trolls not too long ago. Had interviews with a bunch of them, with photos. They were the ugliest people that you could possibly imagine. Outcasts. And they took that hate and poured it out into social media. You should not be afraid of these people—they are nobodies. I actually know a guy who is an internet troll in my town. Loser.

How do you get to be antifragile? Lots of hard work and lots of being shit on. You know who the most antifragile person in the world is, the person who truly does not give a fuck what other people think? Monica Lewinsky—the first person to be internet-shamed. It’s still going on, 25 years later. People are still shitting on her. And she seems pretty happy. I don’t follow her on Twitter, but I’ve seen some of her tweets, and she has a terrific sense of humor. I suppose it’s the Nietzschean thing—what doesn’t kill you will make you stronger. But it is absolutely true.

My favorite scene in Moneyball—the book—is where Billy Beane is sitting next to Lenny Dykstra in the dugout. Dykstra looks out at Steve Carlton on the mound, warming up. “Who’s that old man? I’m going to stick him.”  Billy Beane says to him, uh, Lenny, that’s Steve Carlton, he’s like the second-best pitcher in the history of baseball. Dykstra says, “I’m going to stick him.”

Lenny Dykstra was antifragile, in that he didn’t know enough to be scared. There’s some wisdom in that. I try to live my life like Dykstra (the baseball player, not the investor)—absolutely fearless, and not seeking anyone’s approval. But of course, I do crave approval. I like it when people say nice things about me. I still am occasionally hurt by people’s words. But I’m a lot better than I was in 2011, when I spent two hours starting at that FT story about me on my computer screen.

But I think if you were to ask people who are close to me, they will tell you that I have been a maverick of sorts, even going back to high school. I once wore seven earrings, you know. I wore a shirt with a USSR flag on it, not to make any kind of political statement, but simply because it would tweak people. In today’s parlance, we would call this DGAF. I have had my share of detractors my entire adult life—I talked about this obliquely in my piece about the military, where I had very few friends. I was doing what I thought was right, consequences be damned. People make movies about this sort of stuff. These are our heroes, right? One man against the system? There is a fine line between being a hero and an asshole. Some of the world’s most iconoclastic people are also very difficult to get along with.

These days, I don’t have any particular cause that I am fighting for. As Animal Mother said in Full Metal Jacket, “If I’m going to die for a word, my word is poontang.”  I’m just trying to make a living writing about money. One man against the system usually doesn’t work out too well. The system will squash you like a bug. Live a principled life—there is no higher purpose.

This essay, like most of my essays, is ultimately about integrity. It is about doing the right thing, even when it is the hard thing. It is about doing what is right, but not always popular. As the old finance saying goes, I only care that you agree with me—later.

Go fuck yourself,

Jared

Music recommendation: I recorded what is probably the second-best mix I have ever recorded over the weekend. So dreamy and downtempo. Just amazing stuff. Please give it a listen, and maybe click the follow button on Soundcloud. I put these out about every month or so.:

P.S. We’re Gonna Get Those Bastards will always be free. Please forward to whoever you like.