The Fear of Being Misunderstood Is Preventing You From Growing

The biggest visibility hurdle isn't Imposter Syndrome—it's the fear of being misunderstood.

As an entrepreneur, creator, or visionary, how much power are you giving to the thought of having your intentions misread or facing pushback? That fear freezes you, keeping your authentic message from the aligned audience that needs it most. 

In this powerful solo episode, host Jazzmyn shares real-life stories about overcoming the need to be liked by everyone (from viral content to personal identity) and how to step into authentic visibility with a leadership mindset. 

Transcript

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Are you sitting with thousands of hours of B-roll content and telling yourself, I'll start posting tomorrow? Are you in your head worried about your friends and family thinking your friends refusing to be visible? Are you chasing trends instead of building influence? Welcome to the visibility standard where the visionaries of today are changing the rules of their industry and letting their voice be heard. I'm your host, Jasmine, and we are setting the standard. One of the biggest visibility hurdles that you're probably experiencing is your fear of being misunderstood. And we're gonna talk about it. Hi, I'm Jasmine, host of the Visibility Standard, where being visible is the standard. Every Monday and Friday, I drop episodes, whether it's mindset hacks, guest episodes, with entrepreneurs, founders who are shifting the narrative in their industry and choosing to be visible. Or it's me on the mic sharing insights and reminding you that you deserve to be seen. Today I'm going to be talking about some very real stuff as it relates to being misunderstood and why I completely understand why the fear of being misunderstood is so big for a lot of people. So many people are afraid that their intentions are going to be misread when they post something. So many folks are afraid that people are not gonna understand. They're going to make an impact that they did not intend to make. And that is terrifying in the world that we live in right now, where a lot of people almost get off on misunderstanding. There's people who are antagonistic for fun, like they go into people's comment sections with no picture or no name, and they're like just being a shit for no reason. And that's a real concern for why a lot of people may not share their opinions online, why some people may tend to hold back when they are sharing online or don't make content at all. It freezes them because the thought of being misunderstood is worse than being seen, understood, and celebrated and finding your aligned audience. As I have grown, I have definitely experienced more often, and I think that comes with the territory of being misunderstood. I did a group post pretty recently about how therapists wake up in session, quote unquote. And there were lots of people that completely understood the gist of the video, and there were also a lot of people who completely misunderstood and chose to make assumptions about our character as therapists based on a one-minute and 30-second trend. Going viral gives you visibility, it gives you the opportunity to expand and be in front of new audiences. It does not always do anything for your business, it does not always put money in your pockets, it does not always put potential clients in front of you, it just widens your net. That's what your thing. Great. Go viral, keep doing the trends, and that's why it's important to balance authentic personal brand, mission-driven content, and doing trends. But that's besides the point. The point is that there was a lot of like misunderstanding that was happening in that video. I even have a video circulating over on TikTok right now. I love speaking about real housewives, and so I threw that out there, and people are debating in the comment section. Some people really understand the point I was making, and other people chose to share their disagreeing opinions, and they have that right. Everyone isn't going to understand that video when I am making stronger points in my content. I am choosing to align with points and sharing my personal opinions online, and that's going to come with the territory of being misunderstood, of people agreeing, people not agreeing. I have always been the odd kid out, whether it was in my family, whether it was in school. And I think especially grad school was where I talk a lot about grad school. But grad school is definitely where I experienced the most contention of feeling misunderstood. But that's also because I was not being true to myself. I didn't feel like it could be. I was afraid of being myself and how that would be perceived, or sharing my opinions and how that would be perceived. And so, with all of that pressure on me, I was also afraid to even explore the idea of leadership. And this is coming up much more as I'm reflecting on the trajectory that I want to go in my business and the trajectory of when I want to go with the podcast. Leadership's a big word for me. There's a fear around that word that I am not a hundred percent ready to take ownership of, but it always warms my heart when people share that they feel inspired by what I'm posting or really resonate with what I'm posting and want to spark conversation that always means so much to me. I remember I was sitting in my creativity elective in grad school, and we were talking about leadership, and that conversation for a moment was directly like towards me. And I was like, you know, that makes me really uncomfortable. Honestly, it's because I felt like a fraud. I felt like I wasn't embodying someone that I would want people to look up to because I wasn't always being myself. I was always hiding, or I was always minimizing my own voice or minimizing my own opinions, and curated this very perfect version of how I wanted to be perceived by other people. Now I am thinking more about leadership when I'm thinking about the legacy that I want to leave, and being bold and being seen and part of building is being visible for me. And this political climate, I also want to acknowledge that it is not safe for everyone to be visible, it's not safe for everyone to share their opinion, it's not safe for everyone to be themselves or share specific identities about themselves that are under attack in this current day and age. It took a lot of courage to disclose my sexuality online. I was in the closet for a good chunk of time, like I would say up until like my 20s, like there were people like scattered that knew, but it wasn't ever something that I was boldly ever really talking about. A lot of that stems from the fact that I worked in a Jesus camp setting and attended a Jesus camp setting, and while it was second home, and I carry so many fond memories of the people that I've met there and the place and just the opportunity it gave me to share God's love with other people. There was a real price that I had to pay to do that. If you grew up religious, if you grew up Christian, then you know that there is no identity more important than who you are as a Christian. And I lived that through and through. I was praised for it. Also, Jasmine, you keep it, very focused on camp. And as I got older and started working with kids who were struggling with their own identity who were hiding in various ways, I recognized it was weighing on me so much to continue living that double life. And what I mean by that is basically from May to August, Jasmine was a blank slate. You didn't know much about her, you knew she loved camp, loved being at camp. That was her entire identity. And then in school, I would date like women, and like I was very out, very open, but I wouldn't post it on social media. Like I'm talking my private social media because I did not want someone from camp potentially finding it, and that ruining my time there. It really had to be on my own terms. And so I am someone that has lived like the fear of being misunderstood, the fear of being perceived, the fear of being judged for who you are and how you identify. And I mean, for anyone who is carrying any aspect of that and is resonating with any piece of that story, I do just want to say that it is your timeline, it is your story. There's never any pressure. And when you are ready to share your story, share your truth, I hope that you are surrounded by folks who love you, support you, celebrate you, and throw you the biggest party ever. I am celebrating you and sending you the biggest party ever. If you ever choose to allow yourself to be seen for who you are, in whatever capacity that may be. Something that's allowed me to move with the fear of being perceived. Part of it stems from my work as a therapist. And so I believe wholeheartedly that I am not the therapist for everybody. I believe the people that I am the therapist for, it is a divine fit. It's perfect, it's amazing. Like we click, we get it. I am present, like it is possible. But even when in my internship era, I was like, I'm not the therapist for everybody, and that's okay. I don't need to be. I don't need to know how to solve every single problem because there are people out there that can solve that problem, and there is plenty to go around, and we can support one another and not compete. This idea that I am not the right fit for everyone is something that I have had to translate into my own life and every aspect of my choices, whether that's my relationships, whether that's my work, who I choose to work with, who I choose to work for. All of that gets funneled under the acceptance that I am not the person for everybody. And that's okay. I'm not supposed to be. I'm not meant if I'm being myself, if I am being authentic, then I possibly cannot be everything to everyone. I cannot be the right fit for everybody. Somebody is not going to like me. And that's okay. And if you heard that and you like rippled, if you heard that and you were like, no freaking way, Jasmine. I need people to like me. I really need everyone to feel good about what I'm posting. I need to be celebrated. I want you to go to your journal and I want you to write down, not everyone is going to like me, and that's okay. If I am being authentic, not everyone is going to like me. Because authenticity requires an ownership of who you are and your truth. It is probably like when we think about the probability of everyone liking us for being exactly who we are, that's a wild, pretty wild ratio to expect. But what if you were the perfect match for the people that were meant to find you and the people that you were looking for? Not just them, but for you. And I get it. As somebody who really, I mean, my grad school story is literally me trying to be liked by every single person, every single faculty, every single person that I interact with. It's that's literally it. So I get it. Even when I was in high school, middle school, I was not so much middle school, I was low-key bullied in middle school. But in high school, I really worked to be friends with just about everybody. I so I didn't have a lot of depth in my friendships, but I was acquaintances with everybody. Granted, I didn't have the capacity for depth at the time because depression, but you get it, you get the gist. And so as you are creating, as you are thinking about what it would be like to share your opinions, your thoughts online, the biggest question you've got to ask yourself is am I okay with being misunderstood? Am I okay with people misreading my intentions and commenting? Some people like troll. I and I wanna get that across that not everybody is responding with the utmost sincerity that you may be using to deliver your content. There are people that are trolling the heck out of you. Let them not a Mel Robbins moment on the pod, but let them like they're gonna troll, they're going to do it anyway. You can have a script, you can have it proofread by a thousand people, you can have chat GPT, read it for conciseness, cohesiveness, and there are people that are still going to troll you because that is what they feel like doing, that is their purpose for being online is to troll. But also, are you fully aligned with your purpose? Are you fully tapped in to what source is trying to do through you? Are you fully tapped in to what you believe your personal brand is calling you to do, what your mission is in your business, your values? Because if all of those are clear and you feel 1,000% convicted and moved to live out those values and that truth, then there is nobody that can tell you anything about you that will change you, that will change that because you stand 10 toes down on it, and that is a beautiful place to be. Being okay with not being liked by everybody, being okay with it maybe not appealing to certain brands or certain companies that I may want to work with. Because the right companies and everything are going to find me. When I put that message out into the universe, when I put that energy out and embody that and truly live it out, then it becomes true. And the people that are meant to find me find me. What is one step towards sharing your truth that you can make this week? It doesn't have to be big, it doesn't have to be out loud, but what would it look like for you to share from a place of the right people will find me? I don't need to fit the mold for everybody. I would love to hear your thoughts on that. You can let me know in the comments. You can find out. Me at healing with jasmine. I would love to hear how you are allowing yourself to step in your truth and share your thoughts and stand for something now more than ever. It is so important that we are finding people, that we are the people that are allowing our voices, that our message is being heard, that we are taking up space, that the Joe Rogans of the world don't have space, that we are able to revoke their podcast mics and fill it with purpose driven leaders who are actively making changes in their communities and using social media to change the world at large. I'll see you on Friday. Thanks for sticking around with me. And remember, visibility is the standard.