How to care a less what others think of you?

They can't live your life for you, nor should they. People will love or hate you either way so the important thing is to just be yourself. Some people will like this and some won't but in your heart you will know what you are doing is right.

 

PDAs can unfortunately be tricky - I'm not sure how things are in your part of the world. Obviously don't do anything to put yourself in harms way but if the worst you get is an odd stare then that's not so bad is it? Maybe the more you do it the less the nerves will be.

 

Yes I agree some people are ignorant and will be idiots and no amount of legislation will stop that but the problem is definitely not you. You can't help what your family is like or how you were raised or what religion says about this. It is great that you accept yourself as this is often a big step but denying your true self in order to spare embarrassment or shame for others is no way to live. If your family love you as a person they should at least acknowledge everything else that comes with that.even if they don't necessarily like every aspect equally. Parents tend to have a pre-conceived view of how their kids will turn out to be and when something doesn't quite fit this perfect picture in their minds they can get unnecessarily upset so I appreciate exactly what you are saying. But fundamentally it is your life not theirs and trying to act differently in order to please them is not that good in the longer term.

 

It’s an ongoing battle for me, for sure. I’ve gotten more comfortable with tuning into what I want despite what other people might think or say, so progress has been made.

Exposure and puting yourself in that situation definitely helps, as long as you are in a safe place to do that.

 

I think it helps to distance yourself from people you know and have history with.

I used to spend a lot of time caring about what my older siblings thought of me and would avoid doing things they would not approve of or might make fun of me for doing. It gets boring living like this, not trying things out on your own terms and giving yourself a chance to experience new activities and hanging out with new people.

Now that we are all all older and living our own separate lives, I can go off and do what I want and not care about what anyone else thinks because there is nobody around telling me what is right and wrong. We are still all close and get along with each other, but I found it much easier to discover who I am and what makes me happy without having people I grew up with constantly look over my shoulder and criticize me like they did when we were all younger. Losing that tension in your life can give you more freedom to be what you want and not worry about consequences.