No One Cares About You

No one cares about you. I’m going to start off by getting that out-of-the-way. I don’t think that set in, so let’s try it again.

No one cares about you. Got it? Good, let’s move on to my next point.

No one cares about you. Okay, okay. I’ve hammered the point home. “I get it Tony, ‘No one cares about me'”, so now we can can move on to the meat of this article.

No one cares about you.

All right, seriously this time, I’ll stop. But I really need for that to sink in. No one cares about you. And this is a good thing. Nay, an awesome thing. Let me explain.

First of all, when I say no one cares about you, I don’t mean that in the nihilist “why does nobody want to play with me and when I die no one’s gonna care!” kind of way. Far from it. We are all part of God’s creation and each of us mean the world to Him and those that we love. Heck, even if I don’t know you and I saw you hurt on the street I’d care about you and your wellbeing. What I mean by, no one cares about you, is, no one cares about your opinion or what you think.

Why do I know that no one cares about what you believe in and what you feel? Because you don’t care what others believe in. Because you don’t care about what others feel. You don’t care about other’s opinions and thoughts. Everyone is just a collection of yous to themselves. Let that last sentence sink in, it’s a doozy. Read it again. You didn’t read it again, did you? Fine, let me write it again and just read it slower this time.

Everyone is just a collection of yous to themselves.

You are you. “They” are their own “yous”, to themselves at least. So everyone is just like you since we are all the same. And you don’t really care what others think so therefore others don’t care what you think. It’s a beautiful, self-centered, cycle.

Take social media for instance. What a false sense of self on display that is. And in that theater of false self we get a front row ticket into our broader selves.

Again, you care about what you think and what you feel. You don’t really care about what other people think and feel. Except for the fact that you do care about one thing other people think and feel about… and that one thing is you. And they in turn feel the same way. So what does this produce? A near endless stream of self involved consciousness. I’ll give some examples.

Complaining. People love complaining.

“Why are people such bad drivers!”

“I can’t believe this guy was saying [insert something benign] to his [noun]!”

“Ugh! I hate it when…” or,

“I can’t stand people who…”

You get the drift. This is just passive aggressiveness towards strangers in the hope that others can relate to them. And if people relate, well then, aren’t we justified in our little temper tantrum?

Then there are the belief reinforces. Most of the time they sound a bit like this and genuinely encompass things political in nature.

“I hate people who think we should legalize…”

“I hate people who think we should criminalize…”

“Democrats are so stupid! Look at this!”

“Republicans are so stupid! Look at this!”

“Being a liberal is awesome! Look at this!”

“Being a conservative is awesome! Look at this!”

And so on and so on. Their mind’s are made up. They just want to feed their ego twice over. One, they want to reinforce their beliefs by getting kudos from the like-minded and, two, they want to look disapprovingly to those that they don’t agree with. It’s a win-win for that petty little ego of ours.

Next time, sit back and listen to a conversation. I mean really listen. The old saying is so true, no one is listening, they’re just waiting for their turn to speak. As you sit (or stand, not sure what you’re chilling preference is) notice what you’re thinking. More times than not its something you want to say. But no one cares about you. Because of the same reason you don’t care about them.

Most conversations go like this,

“Me, me, me, me, me.”

“Really? That’s crazy because this one time me, me, me, me, me.”

“Oh yeah! Wow, I know what you mean because me, me, me, me, me.”

“Yeah, I think that me, me, me, me, me. I, I, I, I, I.”

“You do?”

“Yeah. Why don’t you?”

“Yeah, I mean I, I, I, I, I. But that’s just me.”

Meanwhile, there’s a third person listening between the two of them waiting to interject about themselves with an amazing story that starts and ends with, “me, me, me, me.”

It’s all very eye rolling, really.

So knowing all this, how can we better communicate with people? Isn’t human communication a lost cause because we are all on the same agenda of self? No, no. See therein lies the key to making folks happy when communicating with them. Themselves.

People enjoy my company. Everyone loves me. Okay, not everyone. Miserable people don’t like because I’m happy. But besides people who hate themselves and the world, I’m a big ol’ jar of awesomesauce.

Is it because the things I think are so awesome? No.

Maybe it’s because everything I believe in is so great! Nope.

Again, no one cares what I believe in. No one cares about me. So why do folks like being around me? Besides the fact that I’m good-looking (yeah that’s right ladies, I’m winking in your direction) the reason people enjoy my company is because of the value they perceive I bring to them… which is themselves.

Here are two ways I get folks to like me. The first, is listen and talk about them. Boom. That’s the big one. That’s the key. Everyone likes talking about themselves, what they hate, what they like, cetera, cetera. Go with it. Agree with them (when you genuinely do). Ask them why they like this. Ask them why they don’t like that. When they answer you, make a statement about what they said. Then ask another question about them. Or notice something about them. Talk about their known interests. What they’re wearing. Where they’ve been. Where they want to be. They will walk away loving you. Why? Because you talked about what they loved the most, themselves.

This also helps to protect you. All the beans are being spilt on one side while your can is still perfectly sealed. Beautiful.

The second way is harder. Humor. People like feeling good. You feel good when you smile. You smile when you laugh. So if you can bring people a chuckle, they’ll love you. Again, not because they like that you are a funny person, they like that you make them laugh and feel good.

So don’t feel bad that people don’t care what you’re eating, drinking, or doing. I mean, you don’t care what other people are eating, drinking, or doing. No one is being a jerk because they don’t care about pictures of your dog sleeping or your kids eating because you don’t care about people’s pictures of dogs sleeping or their kids eating. Oh! You care about your dog sleeping and your kid eating! After all, they’re your dog and kid. But no one else does. Not really. Unless they’re liars. And if they say they do, they’re just waiting to talk about their dogs and kids sleeping and eating habits.

So go on talking about what you ate, where you drank, what you did. What you like, what you don’t. No one cares.

No one cares about you. No one cares about me. Everyone just cares about themselves. And once you know that, everyone will start to care about you.