As you get older, you learn not to let too many things bother you. This has become especially useful given the rise of social media and what often feels like a daily collision with the opinions of others. As much as you can mute, unfollow and unfriend people you don't like hearing from, coming into contact with contrary or ridiculous opinions is almost inevitable. And you can either let stuff like that get to you or you can just shake it off and move on..
I remember a former boss who once chided our team that "It's not all about you!" Not everything has to be about you or your opinions or what you value. If you take everything personally, you're going to feel like you're "losing" the non-existent game very, very soon.
Another boss once taught me that we should be very careful about whose opinions we heed in life. In his words "The only opinion that matters is mine." What this means of course is that we should keep in mind whose opinions are actually important to us and only focus on these people. This probably includes your immediate family or maybe your significant other. But it may not cover everyone you refer to as a friend.
Friendship takes a lot of work to maintain. And I know I set rather high standards for friends. And when they don't live up to those expectations, I try not to dwell on things too long. But I also don't expect more from the person anytime in the future. Trust is loaned first, and in time someone earns it fully or we feel like we wasted that particular investment. But that's life - we don't always win. But by guarding ourselves and doing our best to minimize risk, we stand a better chance of getting through things with our sanity intact.
And that's just life.
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