Are you surrounded by Yes Men?

We love to get validation. But the problem is, once you are dependent on validation for your ideas and decisions, you stop being yourself!

We love to show off. You put a comment against an influencer’s post – the influencer likes or shares or comments on that. Next, you take that as your bragging right and show off on social media, and people around you go “ga-ga”. This is a complex which is to be best avoided because now you will go after the vanity matrix. You will soon lose your originality.

We deem ourselves to be powerful when what you say, good, bad, or ugly is shared by your “yes men” across their communities! You get a false notion that you are someone great, though there could be more naysayers whom you are not aware of. You soon get cocooned in your island! You stop growing!

When you build a community of yes men, you stop failing (in your mind) because the yes men are always saying yes. No one is there to point out the mistakes. When you stop making mistakes, hubris sets in and your fall begins.

Fear

You are fearful that you will lose your position if people don’t say that you are right. You don’t love criticism. Under criticism, you are always defensive. You give excuses that are all external. These are all signals that you are fearful and when fear rules, you stop innovating – you stop thinking positively – you only think how you can be perceived in a different light. 

With yes men around you there is no criticism and a false notion is created that you are not fearful. You are trying to send wrong signals to your brain and the real “fearful you” remains hidden while the world sees a confident man. This is prevalent in social media and that’s why having validation in social media can be very dangerous! If you are fearful, write down your fears. People love to interact with genuine people. All of us are vulnerable and there is no harm in accepting the truth.

Greed

You have 1000 followers or you lead a team of 100 people. You are the manager and you wish to become VP in two years! You can have a desire but when desire turns into greed, you will do things that will be unethical just like having 20 yes men who put pressure on your behalf to the senior management to see you go and grab the VP post! I recently saw a person having a bio, stating that he is a Padma Shri nominee – now what on earth is that and the guy is 21-22 years old. People write anything on social media and the funny part – the guy has close to 2000 followers. God save these kids – I guess staying at home for so long has taken our creativity to a different level. We have started fantasizing too much.

So don’t build a community of yes men. Build a community where people can express themselves genuinely. Allow yourself to be criticized. I see people deleting comments when they are criticized! Why so? Everyone has their point of view. You can delete if the language is obscene or crossing the line or going too personal. But the problem is that as you build your community, you feel you are someone great because so many people are saying yes and good to you and this leads to a false notion of greatness.

You don’t say yourself to be great – you don’t beat your own drum. Leave that to others! Most of us here, is a work in progress. Many of us are still searching for our own “why”! Many are still grappling with the reason for their existence so with whatever you can, help others to reach their goals. When you help others without expectations you can very well see your community is building around you!

You don’t become an influencer overnight. The people who are influenced by you will keep increasing as you keep growing! But stay grounded, stay humble, control your anger and if you have been able to achieve something in life then share and pay it forward!

The happiness of helping others is something which I can never express because it comes from inside!

A few questions to end this post with:

Are you surrounded by Yes Men? 

Are you criticizable? 

Are you growing realistically? 

Are you happy?

I am looking out for your answers and interacting with you further on this topic.

Stay Safe! Stay Happy!

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