We Don't Need Haters

Yesterday I went to a training seminar for mentors and future mentors. It was an enlightening and energizing experience. There was a lot of good information and exchanging of ideas and opinions. The main topic was ways of dealing with conflict and anger. There was a 21 year old guy in the group that was so motivated by the conversation that he decided to get some mentoring for himself. He was 21 years old with his own business and he wanted to know the best way to control his emotions when people older than him didn’t give him the proper recognition and respect for all the good things he is doing. He said he was tired of people treating him like the typical 21 year old from the hood. I could tell he was really upset by it too. Everyone wants to feel good about what they are doing. He asked the question to the right group because there were a bunch of older people that were eager to give him some good advice. There was a lady sitting behind us who gave him a piece of advice that stuck with me. She told him “Let the people who hate on you be your motivation”. I understand that’s supposed to be a positive statement but it got me wondering when did the lack of acceptance from our people become such a driving force in our everyday lives.

I don’t think I want anyone not liking me because I am doing well. That’s never felt like a good thing to me. Hate is a very negative word. When you hate anything it takes a lot of your energy away. We like to take negative things and change them into a positive. We’ve been trying to do that for years with the n-word but it’s always hard to maintain any boundaries on something like that. There are too many things left up to interpretation. Now we have too many dismissing constructive criticism from people around them as just a bunch of haters in their business. It’s like the only way for anyone to be acceptable in their world is if they agree and cosign on every decision no matter how bad it is. I hate on my brothers and friends all the time because I love them enough to tell them if I think they could do better. I expect them to do the same for me. You need those people around you.

I bet you Tiger Woods would be better off today if one of his inner-circle would have hated on him and told him he needed to calm his hot ass down and stay home with his wife and children. There probably was that person around just like I think someone was telling Michael Vick that he was about to blow 100 million dollars messing around with those dogs. That’s not hate. That’s love and we got it confused.

The brother at the training didn’t need to be motivated by those guys hating on him and the guys who are hating don’t need to be hating either. Negative energy shouldn’t be empowering. That creates a situation where there can be no outreach between both parties to figure out how they can all be successful together. I hate the fact that we take all of this negative energy and try to change it into a positive instead of just getting rid of the negativity all together. We have to turn the haters into lovers so we can all live better. I don't think the negative energy is going to get us very far.