This Mindset Will Change Your Life

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As many of my fellow Midwesterners know, this past weekend was incredibly hot. The kind of hot that makes you sweat in places where the sun doesn't shine.

Even with the extreme heat—not to mention the humidity—I still went for my daily runs. Thursday, in particular, was one of the worst days. It didn’t matter, though. I laced up my shoes and headed out the door. For whatever reason, I like to run in essentially all black clothing, too. I guess I’m just stupid. Let me live.

I did my routine run around the neighborhood. Nothing special or out of the ordinary. Huffing and puffing down the streets, sweat running down my face, I finally made it back home.

For other reasons, my head has been a little clouded lately, so I decided, “You know what, I still have some gas left in the tank.” A crazy thing to say after just running in 100-degree weather.

I grabbed some water, sipped on some Gatorade, and sat for a short cool-down. After about 10 minutes, I decided I was ready to head back out.

My shirt was soaked with sweat, almost weighing me down. As I stepped outside, the humidity hit me like a sauna. Now I was questioning whether this was a good idea.

Then I thought, "Why don’t I just run with my shirt off?" For years this has been a dream of mine. Yes, I’ve dreamt of running with my shirt off—weird, I know.

I’ve just never felt that I was in good enough shape to really do so (and still don’t). But over the past 6 months, I’ve been making the conscious effort to look “good enough.”

When I was younger, I never took my shirt off. Not even at the pool or beach. I used to tell people that I “just didn’t like water.” That was a blatant lie. Although, even today, I still say that sometimes. And it is true. But that’s mostly because working in a waterpark in my teenage years ruined it for me.

I was very, very self-conscious as a child. Since then, I’ve done a ton of work on myself. And last Thursday was the perfect day to show that.

But before I ripped off my shirt, the thoughts started rolling in: “People will look at you, Wyatt. People are going to see you. What if they judge you?”

Those thoughts would have stopped old Wyatt, but not now. I ripped my shirt off and started running for the hills.

At first, I felt vulnerable, almost naked. I felt like everyone was staring at me, just waiting to judge. Then I slowly got comfortable.

No one cares. That is a phrase I want you to tattoo on your forehead. No one cares. No one cares what you do, how you look, or how you choose to go about your life.

People are too worried about themselves to care about you. Absolutely no one cared about me running with my shirt off. The world functioned just fine. Well, some people might have been blinded by my pale skin, but that can be fixed with a few tanning sessions.

My message to you: stop caring. Stop caring how the world will view you. Stop caring about how embarrassing you might look. Just stop. People are too busy worrying about themselves to be tied up in your nonsense.

Until next week,

—Wyatt