Here is the full transcript of author and entrepreneur Teresa Lodato’s talk titled “How To Stop Obsessing Over What Other People Are Thinking” at TEDxGreenhouse Road 2024 conference.
Listen to the audio version here:
TRANSCRIPT:
When I was in high school, I had a bit of a crush on a varsity baseball player named Mike. Every day when I’d get to school, I’d try to figure out if we were going to cross paths during the day. And sometimes it would just happen. But most of the time, it was something I kind of had to plan out.
I’d go stand near his locker looking cute. And when I say cute, I meant really cute. But despite my best attempts, despite furiously batting my eyelashes, he never gave me a second look. In fact, he barely even talked to me.
And in response, I did what everyone else would do. What we do all the time, whether we realize it or not, when this kind of thing happens, I told myself a story about what he was thinking about me and why he was ignoring me. I told myself that he was thinking that he was too good for me, that he was way too cool, and that I wasn’t nearly cool enough to hang out with him and the rest of the in crowd. And the sad fact is that story set the tone for my dating life for quite a few years.
It took a long time for me to realize that I was actually good enough to be someone’s partner. I ran into Mike at our 20-year high school reunion, and I asked him, why did you ignore me all those years ago? I mean, I realized that a long time had passed, but I just had to know. And what I learned was revealing.
The whole time I was trying to capture his eye in high school, he’d been struggling with a concussion, and it seriously impacted not only his grades and his ball playing, but his general ability to focus on anything in school, including me. In fact, he said that his preoccupation and anxiety were so overwhelming that he didn’t even see me there, trying to be seen by him. This happens all the time.
When we meet someone, our brain instinctively weaves two stories about them. One is about who this person might be, pieced together from whatever small clues they offer. The other is a slightly more insidious narrative about what we assume they’re thinking about us. These two stories shape all our interactions. Believing that someone values us, that they like us, that they’re willing to talk to us, can lead to positive engagement.
Whereas sensing indifference or hostility generally results in our responding in a similar way. And that’s what happened with Mike. I told myself a story, an incredibly negative story, about what he was thinking about me, and that his lack of recognition was a reflection of my worth. But in reality, I didn’t know what he was thinking, and I certainly didn’t have a clue what he was actually going through.
We need to stop creating stories about what other people are thinking, and instead become intentionally curious about others and what’s really going on in their lives. This way we create deeper, more meaningful connections in our relationships. Now, the good news is, it’s not you. It’s your brain.
See, the core of the problem is our brains are hardwired for negativity. Study after study has shown that rather than responding freshly to new scenarios, our brains tend to make predictions based on past experiences. And this negativity bias, when coupled with assumed negative intentions from others, can result in distorted narratives that block genuine relationships. And this bias isn’t just a fleeting emotional response, it’s hardwired into our brains.
And while it might have kept us safe once upon a time, it can significantly distort our perception of the world and our interactions with others, leading us to presume negative intentions in our relationships. Now, most of us know that negativity bias is a thing. But the fact is, it is much more of a thing than most of us realize.
The term negativity bias was first coined by a pair of researchers named Paul Rozin and Edward Royzman. And they identified four basic elements of this bias, the first and most foundational of which they call negative potency. And this is the idea that though negative and positive events or emotions may carry an equal impact, might even carry a similar emotional weight, it’s the negative ones that mean the most. We remember them, we return to them over and over. They stick.
And these impressions become self-fulfilling prophecies. Our brains start looking for evidence to confirm the negative stories that we’re telling ourselves. And we don’t know that we do this, we just do it. And the problem becomes especially serious when we begin projecting these negative biases onto others, when we assume they hold unfavorable views of us.
So what are we to do? Well, the first step in overcoming this negativity, in countering it really, because we’re never going to get over it all together, is awareness. The negativity bias is like any other bias. Until we know it’s operating in our system, we can’t do anything about it.
But when we notice a disconnect between what our brain is predicting and the actual interaction, we’re faced with a choice. Do we cling to our preconceived stories about others? Or do we confront the possibility that we might be wrong? It’s essential to question these narratives and break free from our past experiences by approaching each interaction with a fresh perspective.
And the antidote to overcoming preconceived notions is to be calm, be curious, and be connected. The first is be calm. This is the foundation for constructive interaction as well as clear thinking. Achieving a state of calm is crucial in mitigating the built-in influence of our negativity.
When we’re calm, our brains are able to access higher levels of executive functioning, which is responsible for things like rational thinking and emotional regulation.