The Weight of Being Liked

As a society, we have grown too dependent on others. We ask them how we look before we leave the house. We ask if we sounded weird after telling a joke. We check our phones to see who viewed our story. We replay conversations in our heads, wondering if we said too much or not enough. Approval has become part of our daily routine.

Almost everyone is a people pleaser in some way. Some people hide it better. Some people pretend they don’t care. But deep down, most of us want to be liked. We want to be accepted. We want to be chosen.

I am a people pleaser. I try to seem perfect to others when I feel like a complete mess inside. I try to control how people see me, carefully adjusting my personality depending on who I’m around. Around one group, I’m quieter. Around another, I try to be more talkative. I laugh even when I don’t find something funny. I downplay my achievements so I don’t seem arrogant. I reshape myself in small ways that feel harmless at first.

But constantly reshaping yourself is exhausting.

Part of why we chase approval is biological. When someone praises us, our brain releases dopamine—the same neurotransmitter involved in reward and motivation. It’s the same chemical that keeps you scrolling on your phone or craving your favorite meal. Approval becomes rewarding. And like any reward, we begin to seek it again and again.

Over time, validation can become addictive.

Psychologists call this “external validation dependence.” When our sense of worth depends mainly on how others respond to us, we stop asking ourselves what we actually think. Instead of asking, Do I like this? we ask, Will they like this? Instead of asking, Is this meaningful to me? we ask, Will this impress them?

But just because something feels good doesn’t mean it’s healthy. Dopamine teaches us what we enjoy. I like to write because it gives me satisfaction. But that doesn’t mean everyone else will like my writing. And if I stop writing because someone else doesn’t approve, then my happiness was never truly mine—it belonged to them.

It isn’t possible for anyone to completely not care what others think. Humans evolved in groups. Thousands of years ago, being rejected from a tribe meant danger. Our brains are wired to fear exclusion because, historically, exclusion meant survival risk. So when someone dislikes us today, even if it’s just socially, our brain reacts as if something bigger is at stake.

That fear is natural.

The problem begins when that natural instinct turns into constant pressure.

Within pleasure is pressure. Every time you get a good grade, people praise you. They tell you you’re smart. Talented. Capable. And at first, it feels good. But then something shifts. You don’t just want to succeed—you feel like you have to succeed. You feel like you must protect that image.

The human brain prefers consistency. Psychologists call this cognitive consistency—the desire to keep our self-image stable. So when you get a bad grade after a series of good ones, it feels worse than just getting a bad grade. It feels like you’ve broken a pattern. Like you’ve disappointed not just others, but the version of yourself they believed in.

Success becomes something you defend rather than something you experience.

This reminds me of Newton’s First Law of Motion: an object in motion stays in motion unless acted upon by an external force. When you build a reputation—“the smart one,” “the funny one,” “the nice one”—people expect you to keep moving in that same direction. Any deviation feels like an external force pushing against you. And the resistance can feel intense.

But here’s another comparison: entropy, a concept from thermodynamics. Entropy states that systems naturally move toward disorder. In life, things won’t stay perfectly organized. Your reputation will fluctuate. Your grades will rise and fall. Your social life will change. Trying to maintain a perfectly controlled image forever goes against the natural flow of change. Disorder is not failure—it’s part of the system.

You cannot make everyone like you. No matter how careful you are. No matter how kind you try to be. There will always be someone who misunderstands you, someone who doesn’t connect with your personality, someone who projects their own insecurities onto you.

It’s almost like the law of polarity: where there is positive, there must also be negative. For every person who admires you, there may be someone who criticizes you. For every compliment, there might be an insult. Balance doesn’t mean equal amounts—but it does mean opposites coexist.

You cannot receive universal praise because humans are not universal.

Another scientific idea that mirrors this is the concept of equilibrium. In chemistry, equilibrium is the state where opposing processes occur at the same rate. In life, approval and disapproval coexist. Trying to eliminate all negative opinions is like trying to remove one side of a balanced equation—it destabilizes the system.

I don’t have many friends. I’m not popular. I don’t constantly hang out with people. For a while, I thought that meant I was lacking something. That maybe I wasn’t interesting enough or outgoing enough.

But I’ve realized something: quantity is not the same as connection.

I could probably gather a larger group of friends if I tried hard enough—if I shaped myself to fit each space perfectly. But would they know me? Or would they only know the edited version?

Loneliness isn’t always a sign of failure. Sometimes it’s a sign of alignment. It means you haven’t forced yourself into places you don’t belong.

There are people who don’t like me. And maybe I wish they saw me differently. Maybe I wish they understood the parts of me that aren’t visible at first glance. But I cannot live my life trying to rewrite someone else’s perception. That is a battle with no finish line.

Another law comes to mind: the law of diminishing returns. The more effort you put into pleasing everyone, the less satisfaction you actually gain from it. At some point, the emotional cost outweighs the reward. You give more and receive less.

So what do you do instead?

You learn to detach.

In Tuesdays with Morrie, Morrie talks about fully experiencing emotions instead of running from them. He explains that the best way to let go of something is to allow yourself to fully feel it first. When you’re happy, feel it deeply. When you’re embarrassed, sit with it. When you’re proud, embrace it. When you’re hurt, acknowledge it.

It sounds contradictory. We think detachment means not caring. But real detachment means caring fully—and then releasing control.

It’s similar to the concept of emotional regulation in psychology. Avoiding feelings makes them stronger. Suppressing embarrassment makes it linger. But allowing yourself to feel something reduces its power over time.

So when you succeed, don’t shrink yourself to protect others’ comfort. Let yourself feel proud. Let yourself thrive in that moment. And when you fail, don’t collapse under the weight of expectations. Feel the disappointment—but don’t build your identity around it.

Because here’s the truth: other people’s opinions are unstable variables. They shift depending on mood, experience, bias, jealousy, misunderstanding. If you build your identity on unstable ground, it will constantly shake.

The only opinion that remains with you consistently is your own.

This doesn’t mean ignoring everyone. It doesn’t mean becoming selfish or cruel. It means listening to feedback without surrendering your self-worth. It means valuing connection without depending on it for survival.

Every day, you wake up with yourself and go to sleep with yourself. Popularity fades. Praise fades. Criticism fades. Trends fade.

But your relationship with yourself stays.

And if you spend your whole life chasing approval, you might wake up one day realizing you don’t even know who you are without it.

Maybe opinions do matter.

But they should never matter more than your own voice.

At the end of the day, it’s you. It has always been you. The lingering of insults isn’t really anybody else’s voice—it’s your own, replaying what they said, giving it power long after they’ve forgotten it. The criticism echoes because you allow it to settle. The praise fades because you don’t hold onto it the same way.

Because when everything else shifts—when the grades change, when friendships drift, when applause turns into silence—the one constant remains. The only voice that never leaves is your own.

And that voice can either become your harshest judge or your strongest ally.

So the real question isn’t whether others will speak about you—they always will. The real question is: when the room empties and the noise dies down, what will you say to yourself?