Hiii beautiful souls! I have a little announcement to make about my new decision to CHOOSE PEACE in every situation that comes my way. Ready?! Here goes:
Every day, from now forward, every time I get a negative comment/email/message/remark from someone who doesn’t support the choices I’ve made in transitioning my diet… my response will be the same: silence.
Since the moment I came forward about my transition from veganism & beginning my eating disorder recovery, I have received extreeeemely negative feedback of some kind or another every single day – at least 20 times a day. Sometimes 50. Sometimes 1,000. I am not joking. Like this:
Some of the criticism is public (blog, Facebook, Instagram, Internet) and some of it is private (email, messages, in person – yikes) so I think that even my biggest supporters don’t realize the scope of the craziness & the attacks.
Now, I’m not saying any of this to garner sympathy. I don’t want sympathy for this! The mean comments don’t hurt my feelings the way they did in the beginning, and they certainly don’t make me question my diet, my choices, my body or my values. What they DO do on occasion is frustrate me, because they saturate a very positive place with negativity and that’s not fun for anyone.
I like to think that I have been open-minded & mature about the “haters” from the get-go, but that’s not aaalllways the case. Sometimes what someone says is so utterly ridiculous or offensive that I feel the need to respond because A) I have the right to stick up for myself, my readers & my brand’s integrity, B) I get a kick out of it sometimes (whoops) and C) when someone says something SO out of left field I feel the need to at least correct them.
All of that being said — I am turning over a new leaf with my response to the criticism. I would say that at this point I ignore about 88% percent of the crap that the negative people say to me. That other 12%… it either affects me and bothers me, or I respond and engage in a ridiculous (and I say ridiculous because there is NO winning when someone is delusional) debate about the same topic time & time again.
Now, from this day forward, I will be responding to ZERO percent of it. Nada. If an email is negative from the start it’s going straight into my trashcan. If a comment is negative I will not even glance at it, or I might because I’m human and then I’ll move on. I’ve said all that I need to say on the subject and further defending myself is silly & a waste of my time.
I am willing to admit that although I’ve TRIED my very best to take the high road with this situation, I know sometimes my frustration gets the best of me. I am not a robot. I am not Mother Teresa. I am a yogi, but I am not so enlightened that I can always just sit tight & not get mad or upset when someone acts in a ridiculous & cruel manner.
However, I am done-zo with feeding into it. You WILL find me laughing about it amongst my friends & TBB Team, because hey — like I said, I’m H U M A N & I know the negativity will continue to come. I am not going to ignore it to the point of pretending it doesn’t exist. It does. It’s something I deal with every day and will continue to deal with.
But what you won’t find me doing is responding or even mentioning it on social media, the blog or anywhere else where I am public TBB & not simply regular TBB aka Jordan. I am making the choice, right here & right now, to choose peace.
The other side of the coin will always be there. The hate, the closed-mindedness, the blind activism, the negativity spurred by insecurity — I get it. It’s not going away. But what I am going to try to do, from my very own personal point of view, is understand that there ARE two sides to every story. For as irrational & insane as I think the negative commenters are, they must in their own way think that I am irrational & insane.
It may not make sense to me but I am going to accept it. I am spreading a message that I believe in, and if others feel offended by that and want to saturate my social channels with what THEY believe in — I am not going to even address it. They will be deleted & their staunch POV can be taken elsewhere.
I am choosing peace because my readers & supporters are WAY too great to have to experience any kind of negativity on my pages.
I am choosing peace because TBB is a place for positivity, happiness, balance, recovery, truth, connection, community, fitness, lifestyle & inspiration. I don’t think there is any room for negativity there — even if it’s purely a response to someone else’s. What’s done is done, I have made my voice heard, and now — lights off.
Peace. 🙂
Who’s ready for some good old fashioned, positive, BALANCED fun? I know I am! So excited to answer all of your Q&A questions this week. Feel free to send them in if you have any more. Can’t wait to get to them & share!