← Call Her Creator with Katelyn Rhoades
Call Her Creator with Katelyn Rhoades
172. They Need You to Be the Villain: Why Explaining Yourself Never Works
00:21:05
Loading summary
Transcript1 lines
- [00:00]
A
This episode is sponsored by Shopify, Whatnot and Storyblocks. If you've ever dreamed of turning your ideas into a business, Shopify makes it so much easier. Whether you're selling products, digital downloads, or building a brand from scratch, Shopify gives you everything you need to create a beautiful online store without the tech headache. Love finding amazing deals. Whatnot is the largest live shopping marketplace in the country, where you can discover everything from collectibles and beauty products to fashion and home goods while shopping. Live with sellers in real time. It's interactive, fun, and full of incredible finds. And if you're creating content like I am, Storyblocks is a game changer. Instead of spending hours searching for the perfect stock footage, music, or sound effects, Storyblocks gives you unlimited access to a massive library of high quality creative assets so you can create content faster and make it look incredible. Ready to check these out? Start your business with Shopify by signing up for your $1 per month trial at shopify.com CHC download the whatnot app today and get free shipping on your first order. Just search wh a t n o t whatnot in the App Store and start scoring amazing deals. And bring your creative ideas to life with storyblocks by visiting storyblocks.comchc all right, so this is gonna suck to hear, but somewhere out there, you are the villain in someone else's story. They have a version of you that isn't entirely true. Maybe it's not true at all. And you know what? You need to let them have it. Because I want you to think about how much of your life that you've wasted trying to explain yourself to people who had already decided who you were. The paragraphs you've sent, the screenshots you've sent, the conversations that you've replayed in your head, thinking, if I could just explain it one more time, they would probably understand. But what if they don't understand you? What if they don't want to understand you? What if they need you to be the villain because the alternative would require them to look internally at themselves? Today, I'm going to talk to you guys about what happens when you finally stop trying to control the version of you that exists in other people's heads. Because you've spent enough time defending your character. You have a life to build, okay? And I think this is especially hard for women because from the time we're little, we're taught to be likable, to be nice, to be easy, to be agreeable. Don't make anybody uncomfortable. Don't be too loud. Don't be too ambitious. Don't take up too much space. And then one day, you start changing. You start setting boundaries for yourself. You stop answering every text immediately. You stop saying yes when you really want to say no. You become more successful, more confident, more visible. You stop explaining every decision that you've ever made. And suddenly things feel good. You're different. You've changed. And then what? You think you're better than everybody else? You're selfish, you're difficult. You're the villain. Listen, maybe you have changed a little bit. I hope you have. Like, that's the point of all of this, right? I hope you're not the same person you were five years ago. I hope you've outgrown relationships and habits and versions of yourself that were keeping you small. But the part that nobody prepares you for is this. Not everyone is going to celebrate the version of you that you worked so hard to become. Because some people only liked you when you were easier for them to swallow. When you didn't have boundaries, when you were always available, when you needed their approval, when you made yourself smaller so they could feel bigger. And the second that you stopped playing that role in their life, you become the problem. So let's talk about this. Why do some people need you to be the villain? Here's something I've had to learn the hard way. Sometimes people need you to be the villain because the truth would require them to take accountability. And accountability is extremely uncomfortable. It is much easier to say, she only cares about herself. She thinks she's better than everyone. She abandoned me. She's difficult. She changed. It's so much easier to say that than saying something like, maybe I didn't support her enough. Maybe I benefited from her having no boundaries. Maybe I was comfortable with a version of her who didn't know her worth. Maybe I hurt her. Maybe I played a role in why this relationship ended. But that those words, they require self reflection. Making you the villain does not. And this is where we get ourselves into trouble, because we think, if I could just explain my side, show them the messages. If they knew the entire story, if I could sit down with them for five minutes, then they would understand. But some people don't want more information from you. They actually want confirmation because they've already decided who you are and now they're collecting evidence to support that. Have you ever noticed that you could do 99 things right? You could show up for them, love on them, support them, be there when Nobody else was 99% of the time. And then one thing happens that they don't like. You set one boundary, you speak up one time for yourself. You say one thing, you choose yourself one time. And suddenly everything you've ever done gets rewritten through that lens. Now, you were always selfish, you were always difficult. You were always the problem. And you're sitting there thinking, wait, that's not what happened, though. And maybe it's not. But you have to understand something. You cannot argue someone out of a story they are already emotionally committed to believing. So what makes us so desperate to clear our name? This is the part I really want to talk about today. Because the viral reel that I posted this past week was about people needing you to be the villain. But I think the bigger conversation is, why do we care so much? Why does it drive us absolute bonkers knowing that someone out there has the wrong version of us? Why do we write the paragraph text? Why do we save the receipts? Why do we send screenshots to our friends saying, see, tell me I'm not crazy? Why do we have imaginary arguments in the shower with people we haven't spoken to in three years? Because we want to control the narrative. We want to be understood. We want people to know that we are good people. And I get it. I feel you so deeply. I really do. I've spent so much of my own time wanting to be misunderstood. Wanting people to know my true intentions and wanting to explain why I made certain decisions and wanting to make sure nobody was mad. Mad at me. I hate when people are mad at me. It, like, physically makes me ill if someone is mad at me. But what I've realized is, at some point, trying to make everyone understand who you are becomes another form of self abandonment. So you are abandoning your own feelings, because now you're spending your time and your energy convincing somebody else of your character instead of living in alignment with it. You're spending so much time trying to prove you're a good person that you're no longer spending that time actually living your best life. And I need you to understand how expensive that is. And if you're sitting there thinking, caitlin, I really. I just. If I could just explain it one more time. If they knew the whole story, surely they'd have to understand where I'm coming from. But here's what's wild. There's actually psychology behind why that might actually never happen. And it breaks my heart, it really does. But once I learned this, it completely changed the way I looked at being misunderstood. There is actual psychology behind why you can show Someone the RECEIPTS Explain yourself 17 different ways and they still refuse to change their mind. It's called confirmation bias. Once someone has decided who you are, their brain naturally starts looking for evidence that proves that they're right. You set a boundary. You are completely selfish. You stop over explaining. You are so cold. And everything you do and say gets filtered through that story that they have. You finally stand up for yourself. See, they knew you were the problem all along. And there's another psychological concept called belief. Perseverance. Basically, even when people are given the information that challenges what they believe, they can still hold on to their original belief. Makes me sick. Makes me sick because I just. I sit here and I think about people that I no longer communicate with and how I. I go back and forth like if we just had one more conversation, they. They would finally see where I'm coming from. But this just proves to me like I could probably talk till I'm blue in the face. And they're not going to get it because of the psychology of our brains. So I need you to hear me when I say this. You may be trying to win a trial that was decided before even walked into the courtroom. You think if you could explain it better, show them one more screenshot, send that paragraph. They're finally going to understand. But what if they don't? What if they don't? Science actually is proving that they more than likely won't. What if the version of you they created is necessary for the version of the story they need to believe? Because if you are not the villain, they might have to look at their own behavior. And some people would rather misunderstand you for the rest of their lives then question the story that they've told themselves. So stop auditioning for innocence in someone else's courtroom, please. Let them tell the story. Let them misunderstand you. Let them be wrong. Mel Robbins. Let them go. Read that book. You have a life to build, and it's actually costing you so much more than you think by letting it bother you. Because every hour you spend spiraling about what someone thinks of you is an hour you're not spending building something, creating something. Loving someone, being present with your kids, taking care of yourself, dreaming about what's next. We do not have an infinite amount of energy in this life. It is finite. Is that the word? Finite? Not infinite, the opposite of infinite. That's what we have. And some of you are giving way too much of it to people who aren't even in your life anymore. I've been there. I'm. I'M there right now, but I'm working through it. But I want you to think about that. Someone you haven't spoken to in six months is still taking up hours of your week. Someone who unfollowed you is still influencing what you post. Someone who misunderstood you is still determining how you show up. Someone who decided you're the villain is still controlling your life. And they're not even there. You're doing it for them. That's the part that gets me, because we talk so much about protecting our time and our energy and setting boundaries, but sometimes the person crossing the boundary is actually ourselves. We keep reopening that conversation and checking their page and asking what they said and seeing if they texted us or called us. And we keep trying to find out who agrees with them, or defending ourselves to people who never asked for an explanation in the first place. And then we wonder why we're exhausted. You're carrying around a courtroom in your head and you're the defendant and the lawyer. You're presenting evidence, you're calling witnesses. And babe, the trial that you were fighting for ended three years ago. It's time to go home. Some people liked you better when you were easier to swallow. It is what it is. Okay, if you're someone who wants to make money online as a creator, listen up. I know a lot of people. They assume you need a massive following or some fancy setup or years of experience before you can actually start earning online. And that's just not true. Fanview is a platform that helps creators monetize their content, connect directly with their audience, and build reoccurring income doing what they're really good at creating. And what I actually like about this is how simple it is. You create content around your niche, you upload it, you build your audience, and start creating income from it. Whether you're into lifestyle, fitness, business, education, literally, whatever, it's built to be beginner friendly. So if you've been sitting here thinking, could I actually do something like this? The answer is positively yes, if you help Getting started. Fanview has a creator academy that walks you through the whole thing, step by step. And if you're ready to start your own creator journey and see what's possible, head over to fanview.com and get started. You guys know I'm constantly creating content between my podcasts, Instagram, and the content we create for our agency clients. One tool that's become an essential part of my workflow is Storyblocks. Storyblocks is a 100% human made stock media library built for creators. It gives you access to millions of professionally curated footage, clips, music tracks, sound effects, templates and images. Every asset is made by a professional filmmaker or artist, never AI generated, and everything is professionally curated, pre licensed and ready to use and monetize content under one subscription. Personally, I use Storyblocks when I need B roll, music, visuals or just creative assets to elevate my content without spending hours searching online. It's helped me streamline my content creation process and it saved me so much time each week. One of my favorite features is that unlimited downloads let you and experiment freely and there are thousands of customizable templates for your favorite editing platforms. Head over to storyblocks.com CHC to access the human made stock media library that's essential to my workflow. And for a limited time they're offering 15% off any annual plan and that discount is only available through my link. Again, that's storyblocks.comchc for 15% off annual plans this was a reel I posted after the villain reel, and I think it might be the part that hits the hardest for some of us. But some people only liked you when you were easier to swallow. When you said yes to them, when you didn't have an opinion, when you were struggling, when you needed them, when you weren't making the money, when you weren't getting the attention, when you were not confident. And then you started becoming the best version of yourself and you started growing and growth and change that relationship. And no one talks about that enough. We romanticize growth. We put quotes on Instagram about becoming the best version of ourself. But what we don't talk about is that the best version of yourself pisses a lot of people off. Nobody tells you that healing can end a lot of relationships. Success can change friendships, boundaries can disappoint people. Confidence, it might make people uncomfortable. And becoming the woman you've always wanted to be might require you to stop being the woman everyone else was comfortable with. And that's really hard. That's a really tough pill to swallow, especially when you're a recovering people pleaser. Because you want to grow, but you also want everyone to like the new version of you. And sometimes you can't have both. Sometimes the price of becoming is being misunderstood. And so here's the hardest part of this all. Maybe you are the villain. Okay, here's where I'm gonna make this conversation a little uncomfortable, because I don't want this episode to become oh, everyone who doesn't like me is just jealous or they Just whoever misunderstands me. She's just toxic. Everyone I've lost was intimidated by my growth. No, not always. Sometimes, maybe. Sometimes we mess up, sometimes we do hurt people. Sometimes you handle something badly, Sometimes you are selfish. Maybe you were the problem. I know, plot twist. And a part of becoming the person you want to be is being able to sit with that too. But you can take accountability without making shame your identity. You can say, I should have handled that differently. I hurt someone. I was wrong. I wasn't the best version of myself in that situation. And then you can apologize and you can learn and you can change and then you can move forward. But what you don't have to do is spend the rest of your life trying to convince that person that you are different now. And here's where I get all hung up. Because I am the first to take accountability. Well, not the first, always, but most of the time I'm there to take accountability. I might hold it for a little bit because I, I, I do hold grudges. But I, I, the people pleaser in me eventually comes forth and says, okay, I was wrong, I'm sorry. And so if you've done all the things to apologize, if you've done all the ways to reach out and see if there's a way to mend things and this person still doesn't want to talk to you, if they still clearly want to believe the made up la la land story that they have in their head, then that's on them. That's what they want to be committed to. That is the story they're committed to. And you just, you gotta move on. Because sometimes you can apologize, you can do the work and they just still will not forgive you. They still won't like you. You are still the villain in their story. And they're allowed, at the end of the day, they're allowed to think that way. Just like you are allowed to move on. Growth is not getting everyone you've ever hurt to approve of the person you've become. Growth is becoming someone who doesn't keep repeating that same behavior. And there's a huge difference. You are not for everyone. And I know we hear this all the time, but it's true. You are not for everyone. I don't think we actually understand what that means because we say we don't want to be for everyone until someone doesn't like us. Then suddenly we're like, okay, wait, not like that. You, you can dislike my content, you can disagree with me, you can unfollow me but could you please still think I'm a good person? No, that's not how it works. If you're gonna live a visible life or build a business or share your opinions or become successful, you have to develop the capacity to be misunderstood by people. Visibility requires it. Success requires it. Growth requires it. You cannot build an extraordinary life while constantly checking to make sure everyone approves of it. You just can not. Because eventually you're going to have to make a decision that makes sense for you and disappoints someone else. And that doesn't automatically make you a bad person. So here's what I want you to do. Don't send that paragraph. The paragraph that you've written six times. Don't send it. The one you sent to three friends first and said, does this sound okay? Don't send it. Stop trying to defend every decision. Stop trying to clarify every misunderstanding. You don't have to provide timestamps or screenshots, exhibits A through F, just delete it. Not every accusation deserves a defense. Your misunderstanding does not require clarification. Not every person deserves access to your side of the story. And sometimes the most powerful thing you can do is just say nothing. Not because you don't have anything to say, but because you finally realized that your energy is more valuable than being understood by someone committed to misunderstanding. You let them talk, let them unfollow you, Let them tell the story, let them have the group chat, let them think you've changed. You did. And then take all that energy that you're about to spend defending yourself and put it into your life. I want to leave you with this. There's probably someone out there who has a version of you that you don't agree with. They might think you're selfish or you've changed, or you're difficult, or you're the villain. And maybe you've spent months or even years wishing that you could sit down with them and finally them understand. But what if you stopped? What if you just accepted that being misunderstood is sometimes the price of moving forward? What if you stopped trying to edit the version of you that exists in someone else's head? What if you just let them be wrong? What if you let them be right about the version of you they knew because you're not that person anymore. And you don't need a unanimous approval to build a beautiful life. You don't need everyone from your past to understand your future. You don't need to defend every boundary. You don't have to explain every decision. You don't have to correct every rumor. Your life will speak for you, I promise. Your character will speak for you, I promise. Everything always comes full circle. The way you love people will speak for you. The way you show up for your people will speak for you. And the people that are meant to know you, they will. So let them misunderstand you. Let them have their version of you. Let them make you the villain. You have spent enough time defending your character. You have a really amazing life to build. All right, I hope you guys like this episode. I'll see you next.