The Consequences of Being Good at What You Do

Chris Peterson

Kelli O'Hara is a Broadway star. She's an incredible performer who will, no doubt, go down as one of the great voices of all time. 

But better than that, she's a good person. Having met her on multiple occasions, and seen the Humanitarian work she's done, she is every bit the encouraging and positive person you would hope she was.

Yet, for as good of a person she is, there are many out there that would love to see her fail. Why? Because she's good at what she does. And the better you are at something, there will be more and more people who will want to tear you down. 

It's the consequence of being successful in any profession. 

It doesn't matter what you do, or how much you give, there will always be people who want you to fall. Oprah Winfrey gives half of her earnings to charity, and people still hate the woman. 

Take this blog for instance. Because of our honest opinions, thoughts and criticisms which have resulted in enormous success and popularity, there are no shortage of people who want to see this blog disappear.  

We've had everything from receiving hateful emails, petitions drawn up against us, threatening to bar us from theaters and people go as far as submitting purposely plagiarized material.

While these things can be frustrating to have to deal with, the truth is, there is nothing you can do to stop it. You can't please everyone and you can't make everyone like you. If you go through life trying to do that, you'll drive yourself insane. 

So what can you do? 

My mentality in response to seeing these things, is that none of it would be happening if people weren't interested in what we had to say. None of this would be happening if we weren't this successful so quickly. None of this would be happening if there people weren't wishing they could do it better. 

But it also means, you're doing exactly what you set out to do and you're doing very well at it. 

So if you're going through something like this, my best advice is, do what you can to ignore the hate, don't let it get to you and keep moving along. If people want to spend moments of their own lives trying to tear you down, that says more about them than it does about you.