How to Resist Corporate Influence and Peer Pressure in a Consumer Culture

In our modern world, multibillion-dollar corporations are all vying for our time and money. They use sophisticated marketing and targeted advertising to shape our opinions and beliefs. While individuals are targeted, these corporations attempt to shape our country and culture. Just look at these lines I pulled from an old diet-coke commercial.

“Here’s the thing about diet coke, it’s delicious, and it makes me feel good.”

“Life is short.”

“Diet Coke, because I can.”

Coca-Cola knows that we know soda is bad for us, but they still need us to buy it, so they change the narrative. They are telling you it’s ok to act on your impulses at the expense of your health because life is short. Yes, life is short and even shorter when you drink manufactured chemicals like aspartame. The diet coke commercial is just one example, but there are endless commercials like it put out by corporations shaping our culture. So, what does this have to do with confidence?

If everyone around you is going down the life is short, so drink soda and eat pizza path, you’ll need the confidence to go the other way. Whether it’s from family, friends, or co-workers, you’re likely to encounter resistance or criticism from people when you make changes that distort their reality. People don’t want to believe how they’re living is wrong, and they will try and break you down to maintain their illusion. Even worse, maybe they know what they’re doing is wrong, but they don’t want to go down alone. No one wants to be on a sinking ship alone, and misery loves company.

Ideally, you’re surrounded by people who respect you and your choices and are happy when you decide to make positive changes, even if they aren’t ready to make those same changes. The worst-case scenario is you have any or all of the following people around you:

 1. The nay Sayer – “You can’t do that” “That’s too hard.”

2. The Hater – “That’s dumb,” stupid, boring, etc.

3. The doubter – “You’ll miss this/it,” “You won’t be able to.”

4. The scared – “What about me?” “But we love crack” “I couldn’t do that.” “You have to.”

We don’t say always or never when it comes to people’s motives or intentions, but the responses above are based on fear. There is fear that what they are doing isn’t good enough, fear of change, or fear of being left behind. Some people with very little confidence will go to great lengths to conceal their fear and will instead insult you, saying things like “You’re no fun,” You’re boring,” or “you’re not man/woman enough?”. These people play off their dig as joking, but they are passive-aggressive and attempt to conceal their fears through insults.

Higher confidence makes you more resilient to the social pressure from people who think you need to get drunk on St. Paddy’s Day, Cinco de Mayo, Rosh Hashanah and every other dot on the calendar. It’s also useful for resisting people who have live, laugh, love artwork, watch the bachelor, and believe it’s always wine o’clock somewhere.

I’m sorry. Allow me to exercise some restraint here; with great confidence comes great responsibility. Most people are products of their environments, and it isn’t their fault they’ve been bombarded with marketing and advertising their entire lives, convincing them that everything revolves around alcohol and junk food. That being said, have a drink, have a pizza, or have a beer, but do it deliberately, because you want to and not because you feel like you have to.

Confidence shouldn’t be used to boost your ego or put other people down. With confidence, you can determine what is cool or desirable for yourself, allowing you to reach your full potential and help others reach theirs. Confidence fosters genuine human connection by routing out fear and ego.