“We spend huge chunks of our life caring what other people think. Here’s a little secret that can flip your world upside-down: Embrace the idea that no one cares.”

So says Krista Bugden. She says that she doesn’t mean that in a no-one-loves-you-bullying-kind-of-way. She means that what you do only matters to you and your life. Other opinions shouldn’t really matter. Why? Because they aren’t you. 

“Plus,” says Krista, “if no one cares, then you are free to fail. You are free to try, and try again.”
Dr Kelly Brogan calls this the path home to yourself. Many of us only step onto this path when we recognize that the way we’re living has stopped being a choice – and has become habitual. 

“The beautiful thing is that once you become aware of these habitual patterns, you choose to reclaim your power of choice and create a more pleasurable experience for Your Self.”

According to Kelly this not only helps you to feel more vital and energized, it also opens a portal to the reclamation of both your physical and mental health and your inner power. In a state of powerlessness, we look to authority figures to tell us what to do. It’s natural to want to feel held, guided and led when we are scared, but it doesn’t mean that we should go into a stupor of obedience.

Dr Christiane Northrup says a number of years ago she was reminded just how deep the ‘trance’ is that keeps women locked into the expectation that their doctors will cure them without their participation.

“During a speaking engagement, I shared with the audience the latest research on how to enhance bone health. All of the methods I shared are natural, relatively simple to adopt, and they work.”

During the questions and answers after Christiane’s talk, a woman stood up. “Her mentality and physical stance were typical of the victim who waits for the outside expert to save her. And it was obvious she had not heard one word I had just so passionately spoken.”

“No one is coming to save you when it comes to your health,” Christiane says. “That’s why every woman needs to educate herself about the health care choices she has and learn to use her inner guidance to make decisions that are best for her. You can call it using discernment, assessing your options, or checking in with your gut. What it really means is you are becoming your own authority over your body, your health and your life.”

“Why are you looking around for help,” Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung asks in ‘The red book’. “Do you believe that help will come from outside? What is to come is created in you and from you. Hence look into yourself. Do not compare, do not measure. No other way is like yours. You must fulfil the way that is in you.”

Carl coined the term ‘individuation’. In ‘Two essays in analytical psychology’ he writes: “Individuation means becoming an ‘in-dividual’, and, in so far as ‘individuality’ embraces our innermost, last, and incomparable uniqueness, it also implies becoming one’s own self. We could therefore translate individuation as ‘coming to selfhood’ . . .”  

Deindividuation, on the other hand, is a state in which you become so immersed in the norms of the group that you lose your sense of identity and personal responsibility, says Charlotte Nickerson. An individual relinquishes individual responsibility for actions and sees behaviour as a consequence of group norms and expectations.

In an Academy of Ideas video on Carl Jung’s method of self-development – ‘The path of individuation’ – it is said that individuation is an effective antidote to diseases of despair, be it anxiety disorders, neuroses or depressions. 

“For while these conditions can stem from a myriad of causes one of the most common is an unlived life, or the feeling that we are stagnating, in conjunction with a nagging awareness of our ever approaching death. Individuation forces us out of these ruts of being and places us on a life path that is both purposeful and meaningful.”

Jung believed that our suffering comes from our unlived life, the unseen, unfelt parts of our psyche. So, live, girlfriend, as only you can. Live your life fiercely and allow yourself to make your own decisions. Don’t be afraid to stray from the herd; rather be afraid of an unlived life.