Perspectives on Perceptions
As I released the ball, I knew exactly what was going to happen. I couldn’t watch. I had made a horrible throw, headed directly towards the drifting safety. Hearing the cheers from the few watching spectators, I received confirmation of what I knew was going to happen: my pass had been intercepted. I crouched down, punched the ground with my fist, said a few choice words, and walked to the sideline. It didn’t matter that I had played a great game the week before, what swirled in my head wasn’t even about my bad decision to make that throw or the poor execution of that throw, rather, I pondered what my teammates were thinking of me and my ability to play quarterback. I was so disappointed in my play that I consciously chose not to re-enter the contest in the final minutes, relying on my team to dig us out of the hole I had created.
There’s a natural tendency to worry about what others think. That was my experience in that football game. I didn’t feel worthy to play again. Yet, here’s the crux of the matter: I thought that my teammates felt the same way. This feeling of insecurity as a result of poor performance has been with me throughout my life. Many times, I’ve felt that if I didn’t hit a high standard for myself, I feared that others would think less of me. But the reality in others’ perceptions is that often those perceptions are nonexistent. More often than not, others aren’t actually thinking about us at all. After all, we all have enough going on in our own lives to keep us occupied from forming negative perceptions or thoughts about others.
I talked to my teammates after I threw that interception, and they told me they hadn’t thought twice about it. Rather, they immediately moved to the defensive side of the ball, how we could get a stop on defense. While I was in my own head about what others were thinking about me, it turns out they weren’t thinking about me at all. It is extremely hard to be comfortable and confident in our world today, yet it is important to remember that others aren’t analyzing our small mistakes. Everyone makes mistakes and has insecurities, yet those mistakes and insecurities don’t define us. We don’t need to worry about how others perceive us, we can focus on being ourselves.
Good Company is a ministry at the University of Kansas. We seek to bring authentic connection in a world of AirPods.