Have you ever felt like your reputation was ruined?

I have. Why and what happened aren’t relevant. What I did about it is live with it. Most times that’s all that can be done. Simply pick up the pieces and move on. That one person or group of people won’t respect you based on their supposed knowledge of you, your reputation, and you just have to rebuild your life from there. I’d prefer not to associate with many of these people either, but life doesn’t let you escape anything.

All you can do is keep on keeping on, and do what you do.
My reputation wasn’t built on one event, and people won’t label you a fuck up just because you made one mistake.
It sure seems like that sometimes, though.

I see reputation as public reflection of who I am. So long as that image seems accurate with the people whose opinions concern me, I’ve got no problems. Because, within that small group, I encourage their questioning me if my actions seem “out of character” I’ve never really found my reputation – whether good or bad – to be in question. Additionally, I generally know what to expect when being introduced to someone for the first time who only knows me through reputation and if significantly different than expectation I’m not afraid to ask why.

In business it was a little different. I didn’t always have “control” over what was said to whom, by whom and the motivations of what was said were not always positive. There were times when I’d find I had an unearned reputation with someone I’d never directly met and, worse, expectations built atop it. In those cases I just try to reset the expectations and from that allow my reputation to be built from first hand experience rather than second hand commentary.

As an extra thought, if your reputation and self image are significantly different, particularly among people who know you well you might do a bit of introspective digging and try to get an idea of from where the disconnect is arising. Understanding that can often help you correct unearned reputations as it allows your actions to be in greater step with your thoughts and beliefs. Beyond that, allow your actions and words work for you, you can’t control what people think and direct confrontation often just makes others defensive, but you can present yourself such that, over time, their conclusions are likely to be more in line with who you really are.

@AnonymousWoman I don’t really worry about what others think of me. You either like what I do or you don’t. I could care less. I’m the one that likes or dislikes what I do. Yes, sometimes I screw up. That’s for me to decide. It rubs some people the wrong way, but frankly I don’t care.

Yes, time and time again. Specifically lately. I was a high flying exec. I had a complete break down and was reduced to a smelly none bathing depressive, who didn’t leave her home for a year. Do I care that the person who every knew and held in high regard is probably talked about in sympathetic terms? No, I care more about how I feel, how I can change my life for the better for me. I never wanted to be defined as an executive and money doesn’t mean that much. Of course I’m in dire straights because I have so little, but I never want to shop for hours to fill that horrible hole inside me again.

So yes, it has been ruined, by other peoples expectations and standards, and sometimes too my own. The most important thing is do I like me? I dont yet, but I am getting there.

We hired a friend once. He was also a farmer and would take months at a time off to harvest. He promised to repay the money for medical insurance and his cell phone when he returned. He had a tax lien that he was disputing. We were holding the money out of his paycheck but not sending it to the IRS during the dispute (he agreed with this.) When he came back to work, and the lien was cleared he told us to take the money he owed for medical insurance and the phone out of the tax lien money. Apparently he forgot to tell his wife (my best friend at the time) about our arrangement. She kept believing my husband owed them. The next year, we agreed to pay his cell phone and insurance while he was gone in lieu of a raise. Come December, we found out he was on a cruise (with a bunch of our other friends) and we were not invited. He was still getting our free insurance and phone. In January he came back to work for a week then had a heart attack. We continued to pay his medical insurance for 6 months. When we told him we were going to have to put him on Cobra, his wife got all up in arms and said we still owed him from the tax lien. She said we couldn’t put him on Cobra because he was on disability.
We were more than generous with him, but she bad mouthed us to all our friends. I lost ALL of my close friends over this and I think we went out of our way to take care of them We spent thousands that most employers that we had no obligation to spend. The worst part is, I loved his wife like a sister. My heart was broken when she wrote our friendship off and accused US of being the ones who were being selfish.

Yes, back when I bought into the notion that it mattered what people thought of me. Now, I couldn’t care less. I’m responsible for my actions and it’s up to me to learn from my mistakes, because they are mine and mine alone. I wholeheartedly agree with what @Adirondackwannabe said.

Ruined is a strong word…just think of reputation as a temporary thing. The world keeps on turning we keep on changing, we meet new people and sooner or later you wont even connect yourself to this ‘bad reputation’ you might have. The only thing that should matter to you is what you believe about yourself and the people that stick by you :)