Do you like to please people? It's probably holding you back from success...and shaving your head

This is understandable (at least for me) that guys would care what these people think because these are important people in thier lives.  Though, the problem is they're too worried about the short term rejection that they may get from these important people and this can cause them to delay or never make the decision to do what they really need to do to help themselves.  This fear also blinds them from the reality that if they made the decision to help themselves, it would actually please all these important people much more down the road than it will in the immediate future.  How can this be?  Well let set a fictional example.

Jim, a 20 year old guy, finds out that he's losing his hair and it starts bringing down his confidence.  He gets the idea in his head to shave his hair off and is pretty excited about it.  Then, as he starts to ask the typical questions to himself about how he's going to look and what others will think and all the sudden it pops into his head that his parents will not approve of him shaving his head.  Jim then begins to agonize over losing his hair and believes that shaving his head will relieve him of freedom, but that freedom is not worth the price he has to pay in making his parents mad.  Time goes on and Jim has a hard time getting a girlfriend because his confidence is low from his hairloss.  He then starts losing out on promotions at work to less qualified people and is told the reason is due to his lack of confidence and inability to lead others.  His parents then start pestering him over and over as to why he doesn't have a girlfirend and begin to worry that he'll never find that special someone and they won't have grand kids.  Jim's parents then start asking why Jim hasn't moved up at work and again, he's unable to please his parents.  All because he couldn't do one thing for himself instead of trying to please others.

Now, let's flip this story and show what could happen if Jim does shave his head.  His parents are not too happy with his decision and let him know it.  Though, a couple monthis down the road, they see that he's much more confident than he used to have.  He now has confidence and soon meets the love of his life.  This propels his confidence even more and he starts moving up at work and his bank account starts to grow.  He's now the source for his parents constant bragging of him to their friends.

Sure this is a fictional story, but it's not too far off from reality.  I know because I see it often both here on SBG and other places.  This also doesn't just happen with guys that are fearing losing their hair, but it can translate to other things like starting your own business, or moving to that new city, or taking that new job.

So, how do you avoid making the mistake of pleasing someone else instead of doing what's best?  The next time you really want to do something and find yourself really worrying about what others might think, stop yourself and realize that you are about to make a decision that's based on pleasing someone else and really examine your decision to see if giving short term pain to that person may actually be the best long term decision.  My guess is that it will be.