What do People Think About Me?

I am a paracounsellor. I listen to people's rants and problems. Lately I observe a certain kind of thinking. It's called "What do people think about me?"

Examples:
"My friends are losing their virginity as a rite of passage. I felt like an oddball being the only
virgin."

"Don't think I'll really wanna be a stay-at-home husband even if my wife earns 5-7k a month..., main reason is still the social stigma cos men are expected to go out there and work..."

They lives to please other people. They want to live to their friends' expectation. They want to be accepted by their peers. They want to belong to the club. They forget to ask, "What do I think about myself".

They forget that they are going to live with the consequence of their decisions, not their friends.

"It is not the critic who counts:
not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles
or where the doer of deeds could have done better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena,
whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood,
who strives valiantly,
who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming,
but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause;
who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement,
and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls
who knew neither victory nor defeat."
-- Theodore Roosevelt