FOPO

How Fear of Other People’s Opinions Hinders Our Success (and What Steps We Can Take to Overcome it)

“Hit it, then forget it!”

That was the advice my daughter’s tennis coach kept reiterating to my ten year old last Sunday. The coach explained to me that my daughter was hitting good shots, but she was so busy watching to see where they’d land that she wasn’t ready for the next one coming her way. 

“Hit it, then forget it! You’ve done your job. Get ready for the next one!” The coach shouted. And I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since. 

Little did the coach know that the very next day, I had to give the final sign off on my book so it could go to the printer. It’s been years of writing, and editing, and reading, and repeating and now, it’s really out of my hands. It was so hard giving that final greenlight—knowing I no longer have control over this thing I’ve put so much into for so long. 

So in that moment, the coach’s simple mantra felt like the honed wisdom I really needed to hear at that exact moment as I was mustering the courage to let it go. 

It got me thinking, once you’ve hit that shot, there’s no going back. You can’t control where the ball lands with pure will or a prayer-filled stare. And yet most of us stand there, hoping, wishing, and missing the next play. Why? 

Why is it so hard to let go of control for most of us, and why are we so fixated on the outcome that we forget to play the game? 

Photo by Bare Kind on Unsplash

The more I thought about it, the more I think it comes back to our high-performance culture and our sense of identity being tied to how well we do something. And that has everything to do with a little (okay, massive) thing called FOPO: Fear of Other People’s Opinions. 

In his book, The First Rule of Mastery, sports psychologist Michael Gervais describes FOPO as “a hidden epidemic” that “may be the greatest constrictor of human potential.” 

You may be wondering why it’s bad to care about other people’s opinions. After all, it’s human nature to want to be liked and accepted by others, right? For thousands of years, our survival depended on our ability to be accepted into tribes and villages and contribute to the community. But in our modern world, this fear of other people’s opinions has become unhealthy, unhelpful, and damaging to our mental and emotional health. 

As Gervais puts it “with the proliferation of social media, the intense pressure to succeed . . . we trade in authenticity for approval. We don’t raise our hands when we can’t control the outcome . . . We externalize our self-esteem, our sense of value. We see ourselves through the eyes of others. We look outside of ourselves to determine how we feel about ourselves.” 

In other words, if our identity is built on being a good tennis player, every play validates our sense of self or it tears it down. 

If our identity is built on being a good writer, every positive review makes us feel like we’re validated and valuable, whereas a bad review sends us down a rabbit hole of shame and self-doubt. 

So how do we get over this very ancient, but still very real fear of other people’s opinions. Or, at the very least, how do we feel the fear, and do what we want to do anyway? 

Gervais points out that it really goes back to having an internal sense of who we are versus basing our identities off of things that are out of our control. Here’s an example of the difference: 

External Identity: I’m a straight A student. 

If getting straight A’s is part of your identity, when a teacher decides to give you a B, your sense of self crumbles. 

But when your identity is rooted in internal values and ideals, it’s harder to shake. 

Internal Identity: I care about learning and try to do my best

Now, no matter the outcome, or what grade you get, your sense of identity remains intact. Even someone sharing an unwelcome opinion like “you’re stupid” shouldn’t crack this person’s sense of self because it’s rooted in their own values and effort, not what other people think of them. 

So as the calendar ticks down to my release date, and my FOPO starts to get the best of me, I just keep repeating my new mantra:

“Hit it, then forget it! You’ve done your job. Where it lands is out of your hands.

Get ready for the next shot!”

Did this resonate for you? If so, drop a comment or hit reply. I’d love to hear from you. 

P.S. If you’re a writer and not already using Substack, I highly recommend checking it out. It’s basically a blog, but on a social platform (so people can actually find your awesome blog instead of it collecting dust in cyber space). Plus, you can interact with others who are interested in the same topics. It also acts as a free email newsletter service (you can import your existing email list, or start one through Substack so you can keep in touch with readers). It even offers the option to charge for exclusive content so you can earn money offering valuable content to your readers on the platform. Maybe best of all, it’s ad free, so no need to scroll past a dozen ads and AI generated content just to find something of value. And, on that topic, I was NOT paid to write any of this ;)