So yesterday I posted "How to become smoke free: My journey, trials, failures and successes - An introduction" (https://www.rachaelandtom.info/content/how-become-smoke-free-my-journey…) which I shared on Facebook. Immediately the first comment I received was a negative support comment - what do I mean by that?
Well the "It's easy to give up step 1 - say I'm giving up! step 2- stop smoking! so JFDI"
Now there are a few points here:
Yes some people may find it that easy, however I've tried this before and it hasn't helped otherwise I'd have stopped one of the, probably, 10 times or so I've tried in the past. If this works for you and you can stop with these 2 simple steps FABULOUS, if you have tried and not managed it, don't worry the same has happened to loads of people.
Second JFDI - here is an acronym I hope you've worked out but I find it really unhelpful in this situation, Just F*****g Do It, again if it was that simple, there would be no reason for me to be posting this series, so the fact I'm writing this series means I can't JFDI otherwise I'd have done it by now.
Third - This is what I posted on Facebook "So I've just published my first private blog since October 2014. This is going to be a regular thing now, with the aim of helping me achieve my dream. Will you take the time to help and support me?" How is the original comment helping or supporting me?
Sometimes comments like this can be helpful but for me, when I read that, I thought they haven't even considered how I feel, or what I'm going through. They are knocking what I'm trying to do which is to achieve my dream. I'm not there yet and that's so negative - I best head outside, have a cig and calm myself down.
So you see, I need to work on turning the way I view these types of comments around, learn to not associate cigs with calming myself down or with negative comments.
Acknowledgements
One of the people who has helped me to get much better at changing the way I view negative comments is Brad Burton http://www.bradburton.biz/ . Brad is the Founder of 4Networking, http://www.4networking.biz/?ref=106077 , the UK's number 1 motivational speaker and a great friend to me. Almost 2 years ago when we first connected on twitter and then spoke on the phone Brad said to me "You need to get a thick forehead. Negative comments will hit it and bounce off. Currently you can cope with a ping pong ball, just, eventually you will manage a golf ball."
Thanks Brad - I'm now able to have "tennis ball" comments bounce off without hurting me, however I'm sure I'll get to a golf ball soon and when I do, comments like "JFDI stopping smoking is easy" will take on a whole new meaning.
To my friend who posted that comment - I really appreciate you taking the time to interact with me on Facebook and if your advice does help someone else to stop smoking, then that would be fantastic, it just hasn't worked for me in the past.
And to Laura Lucas, https://www.facebook.com/laura.lucas.35912 , who made the whole of her lightening talk at The Content Marketing Academy about how JFDI can be a positive thing for businesses.