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Original poster

What did one person say to you that changed your outlook on life?

288 replies

bearlyactive · 25/08/2020 11:10

I suppose I should go first...

They told me, after something bad happened to one of my relatives, that "the hole in your heart will never heal, but you'll learn to build yourself around it". I had been feeling hopeless up until that point, but it helped me change my viewpoint.

Anyone else?

OP posts:
nobodysdaughter · 26/08/2020 14:12

"Maybe you should try and get attention from people by being kind to them, rather than being a bitch."

LilyLongJohn · 26/08/2020 14:18

I have two that have helped me. I'm quite an anxious person who worries a lot.

Will this matter in 5 years time.

And

You ALWAYS have a choice

JustHavingANap · 26/08/2020 14:25

No one is ever going to love you.

Talk about a self fulfilling prophecy...

LilyLongJohn · 26/08/2020 14:29

In my late teens early 20s I worked for a financial services company. I sat next to an really old man (probably in his 40s) Grin he advised me to put as much money as I could afford, into my pension.

I'm now in my late 40s and should have a healthy pension, and be able to retire at 69. Not masses but a nice 30k a year to look forward to. I'm in a lot better position to a lot of my friends and I don't feel I missed out at all.

Bells3032 · 26/08/2020 14:30

three and a half years ago after seeing me with another loser my friend asked me why i always dumb myself down for the guys i like. He basically told me off as i was an incredibly smart (without sounding too arrogant) woman who knew what she wanted in life and could challenge any guy. He said i turned completely submissive when in a relationship when i was so boisterous generally and he didn't get why i did it.

It hurt me at first but i took his words on board and decided to throw caution to the wind and on dates act like my complete, honest self.

I've been married a year. you ask my husband what is the thing he loves the most about me and he will respond instantly it is my mind. When i got engaged i thanked said friend for helping me find a man who i can be completely myself with.

Cluckycluck · 26/08/2020 14:33

What other people think of you is none of your business

What is meant for you will never pass you by

Mashingthecompost · 26/08/2020 14:34

I had a tough time with birth (I know that's not a unique event) and blamed myself for "allowing" myself to end up on the intervention train when I wanted a home birth. A friend in a group said, in relation to medical intervention and "natural" birth, "Nature has a much higher tolerance for loss than we do."

That helped me wake up to a more realistic perspective on what was needed to keep us both safe, and I've never forgotten it. I didn't even want to hear it at the time.

hilariousnamehere · 26/08/2020 14:38

Bookmarking to come and read all these :)

I have a few but my most repeated is that if you can do 100% of the job on your first day, you're in the wrong job. It's excellent advice and stood me in very good stead until I quit to run my own business.

RefuseTheLies · 26/08/2020 14:39

Sink, or swim?

I always choose swim.

ImaSababa · 26/08/2020 14:47

@JustHavingANap

No one is ever going to love you.

Talk about a self fulfilling prophecy...

But how did this change your outlook?
ZaphodBeeblerox · 26/08/2020 14:47

Such a lovely positive thread.

Many of my personal favourites are mentioned above already.

When going through a very dark time personally, I found Hebrews 11:1 really comforting : Now Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. I’m not Christian and didn’t grow up around the bible, but read it somewhere and it seemed so apt.

Iminaglasscaseofemotion · 26/08/2020 14:55

Always expect the worst, then you won't be disappointed.
No one actually said that to me, it's what I tell DP. He is ever the optimist and always over estimates everything. He is usually wrong which I used to find really disappointing because he would get my hopes up with things, so I changed my outlook. It really helps. Now all I ever am is right, or pleasently surprised.

People don't change.
Again just something I've learned myself.

Things always work out in the end.
My mum always says this. Actually I think it was one of my grans (a wan of very few words or complaints) It's true, even if they don't work out the way you had hoped.

TheDogsMother · 26/08/2020 14:56

Eat the frog. As in get the worst task/conversation/chore done first otherwise it will hang over the rest of your day.

Strokethefurrywall · 26/08/2020 15:17

Two separate events were pretty defining for me. The first was when my younger brother decided to stop his chemo and enjoy his final months, I remember sobbing with my friend and saying "this year is going to be one of the worst of my life..." and she just smoothed back my hair and simply said "Yes, it is".
To hear someone acknowledge truly what was going to happen and not try to placate me with platitudes of fighting on, or "perhaps they'll find a new trial" was refreshing and helped me accept the inevitable for him.

The second was when I was just before I was due to perform in NYC with my band for the first time and I was mind blowingly terrified. Vomit in mouth, sweaty palms, hyperventilating fear. Until a friend said to me "if you're so scared then why are you doing it?"
I realised then that I was letting my nerves get in the way of my joy and since then I allow myself to have "the fear" until I leave for the airport, and then I get my game face on.

DancingCatGif · 26/08/2020 15:25

@ByGrabtharsHammerWhatASavings I was the same and now have no male friends, only female.

Thecazelets · 26/08/2020 15:45

'Well you're allowed to have higher standards than that!' - said to me in astonishment by a very good friend about a very jealous and controlling boyfriend in my early 20s. It was the push I needed to escape - I don't think I'd fully understood until that point that being in the relationship could be a choice not an obligation.

Also a work one from DH - getting 80% right 80% of the time is good enough. Striving for 100% perfection all of the time can mean you end up getting nowhere. (Related, I think, to the one about women only applying for jobs when they meet all the criteria, when men merrily apply when they only meet a few.)

Saffzy · 26/08/2020 15:50

“Wherever you go, there will always be one nice person” said to me by a colleague when I was leaving a job I had worked at for years.

MelancholicMood · 26/08/2020 16:07

"Progress, not perfection''. I am a perfectionist and pretty all-or-nothing so it helps me to see the bigger picture. I find it particularly helpful with my diet and exercise.

and part of a quote: "the longest-lived and those who will die soonest lose the same thing. The present is all that they can give up, since that is all you have, and what you do not have you cannot lose.” - Marcus Aurelius.

DirtyDripSpout · 26/08/2020 16:11

You always have a choice.

I find this really helpful when things seem out of my control, I realise I may not be able to change the event, but I can choose how, when, or even not to react. Just by reminding myself of this saying, makes me feel instantly calmer and that I'm more in control of the situation.

shartsi · 26/08/2020 19:54

I like this one

What did one person say to you that changed your outlook on life?
tootyfruitypickle · 26/08/2020 20:07

After a dv incident, a policewoman calling me up and just simply saying ‘enough is enough’ . That’s when I made the decision to leave.

HenSolo · 26/08/2020 20:15

When I was your typical tormented teenager I watched Terminator - there’s a scene at the start where Sarah Connor is waitressing and it’s all going wrong and she’s getting stressed. Her colleague sidles up to her and says, “In 100 years, who’s gonna care?” Makes me put things in perspective a little when I think of it...

Hardbackwriter · 26/08/2020 20:17

I suffered really, really badly with imposter syndrome in the first few years that I was working as an academic, to the extent that the anxiety became so overwhelming that I ended up contemplating suicide and on antidepressants. I had lunch with my old PhD supervisor and ended up sobbing my heart out to him. He pointed out - in such a nice way - how arrogant my mindset was: that I really thought I'd fooled all these incredibly clever people into passing my PhD, giving me a job, thinking my conference talks were ok, etc - that I thought I was the only person who could judge the quality of my work even though these people were all so much more experienced than me. He pointed out how weird it was that I trusted his judgement, for instance, on literally everything relating to our subject except my own capability in it. It was such a total shock to think about it that way and I'm not saying that it cured everything instantly, but I did never see it all quite the same way again, and still find myself going back to that advice/viewpoint in my head a lot.

ilovebagpuss · 26/08/2020 20:24

After losing my mum and being mired in life and generally feeling lost I found some of her old letters to me at uni.
She was saying how she needed to get my dad to get on with decorating the bathroom and she remembered her grandmother’s saying from when she was little “help yourself little girl help yourself don’t wait to be waited on.” So she was going to crack on herself. Anyway it just gave me that link through a line of strong women and made me sort of get on and pick myself up.

Letsnotargue · 26/08/2020 20:27

I used to get really upset with my mum being so useless (she is officially useless) and would often feel really let down by her.

A friend once quite bluntly asked ‘isn’t that why you expect from her by now? She’s not going to change at this point’. It has helped me reframe the issue and now I see it as a continuation of the same issue rather than an individual let down every time.

Doesn’t sound very positive now I’ve written it down, but it’s really helped.