As you get older you start to pay attention to your personality flaws.

We all have many.

The question is whether or not these flaws prevent you from being a good person or whether or not you can be part of the many social circles we go in and out of each day of our lives.

I made a mistake today. Again. I asked someone last night to play golf with me then canceled on him this morning.

He wasn’t happy.

Why am I telling you this? Because one of my flaws (one of my many flaws but definitely one of the most important), is that I have a great need to be liked by everyone. So my first thought and what is still bothering me while I am writing this is that “he hates me and doesn’t want to be my friend anymore.”

You are probably rolling your eyes at reading that and saying to yourself, “that’s ridiculous!”

And as ridiculous as that probably sounds, he probably thought the same thing because when I said to him “I understand if you never want to speak to me anymore and not be friends”, he said that statement was “immature” and “of course he would not stop talking to me over this.” Rather he was “just pointing it out as friends that he shouldn’t have been treated like that.”

That statement from him is little consolation and the incident, as well as what he said (which felt like being scolded), still stings and still bugs me.

All my life I have had this issue with being obsessed with the need to be liked. Whenever I meet anyone, whether socially or in a work setting, I am afraid that they won’t like me. Even when I was a school administrator I felt this way toward my colleagues and subordinates, (which is one of the reasons I don’t think I was ever truly successful in those positions). I even joined a fraternity years ago to try to be liked. Joining meant the hope of meeting more “brothers” and making life-long connections with people and would fill the void that I somehow felt was missing in my life.

Boy was I wrong. On all parts.

People from current and former friends and past mentors, teachers, and even therapists have told me that I should never worry about what other people think and feel about me but I have always and still find that advice almost impossible to follow. Even my dad told me far too frequently that I would be better off if I didn’t let this affect me but I just couldn’t (and still can’t).

Sometimes I feel like I will always have this issue and need to find some way to live with it because I don’t think I can or ever will overcome it.

So, where does that leave me? What is it about me that needs to be liked by everyone? What is it in my personality that can’t accept that not everyone you meet in life will like you or want to be your friend. For example, I have a co-worker at my current school where I teach who almost never speaks to me unless she has to or needs something. She certainly spoke to me when we first started the this school year, even inviting me to eat lunch with her and sit with her at the cafeteria table, for another example, but now we will walk right by each other, look each other in the face…and keep walking.

It bugs me to no end.

And I have to get better with this and not let things like that bother me.

Forget the fact that we never know what people are going through (and BOY is she going through A LOT this year and is struggling mightily with her classes and our supervisors), and that the fact that she doesn’t speak and has “changed” (in my probably warped perception) more than likely HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ME!

This I really need to learn and accept. Because it is something that I know has affected me and certainly my relationships with people and how I interact with them.

What I know is that I can’t keep going on though life, sitting at home alone, afraid and afraid to leave the house and be out amongst people just because in the back of my mind, I am wondering if they all really want me around them and are secretly wishing I wasn’t there with them. It’s a debilitating thought process that borders on the irrational. Everyone has flaws as do I but I can’t personalize every action and feeling from others and overthink (WOW, how many people have told me that and how many times have they told me that? I’ve lost count. ) that just because a person’s actions are not how I see them, doesn’t mean that they don’t like me. Rather, they probably are going though something that simply has NOTHING TO DO WITH ME.

But as the saying goes (and not that I am overly religious), “there but for the grace of God, go I.”

I’ll end this here for now (because I could go on for DAYS about this…but I will definitely write more about this at a later date) but I hope that one day…one day, I can be better with this and conquer this monster that has tormented me and my life for as long as I can remember.