Handling the “Yeah, Right” Crowd

I was probably about a year into working from home as a writer when I stopped telling people that I was (and am) a freelance writer. I started telling people I was (am) a professional writer or that I create digital content. I started doing this because the almost immediate response from people was, “Oh, are you between real jobs?” Then, they usually followed up with other questions that were rude and not their business…the questions you wouldn’t ask someone who holds a more traditional job.

I’ve also ran into the “Yeah, right” crowd. You know, the people that do not believe that I make a living from home. Make money writing? Yeah, right. You don’t need a “real” job? Yeah, right. You write textbooks? Yeah, right. You’ve ghostwritten how many books? Yeah, right.

The “Yeah, Right” Crowd Is Annoying

There’s a big difference between someone who is blown away and has questions about how I’ve made working from home work for me and someone who doesn’t believe it’s ever possible.

Never mind the articles on Forbes, Inc, and lots of other well-known business sites. Never mind the existence of the Internet which has made it possible to do business anywhere from the air conditioned comfort of my own home.

The “Yeah, right” crowd is annoying. It discounts the hard work those of us who do work from home successfully have put into our business over the months and years.

Why Does It Happen?

So, why do people end up part of the “Yeah, right” crowd? The basic explanation is that they tried to do something, something big that was a dream, and it ended up being harder than they thought. It took more work than they thought it would. It wasn’t just handed to them. They quit. They found excuses (that they call reasons) about why they couldn’t keep striving toward their goal.

Their inability to meet their goal changed everything for them. If they couldn’t do it, no one can…and that includes you. So clearly everyone who made it work is lying about it. It can’t be that those of us that succeeded faced (and continues to face) problems and temporary set backs. It can’t be that we’ve had times where we thought about quitting and didn’t. It can’t be that we worked crazy hours even when we had a traditional job and continue to work crazy hours now from our homes.

I’ll say it again for those in the back:

The “Yeah, right” crowd exists because they failed. Since they couldn’t do it, they would rather believe it isn’t possible instead of seeing themselves as a failure or a quitter.

Dealing with the “Yeah, Right Crowd”

So how do you deal with the “Yeah, right” crowd? You just don’t. There’s no making them happy. They are jaded because of their own shortcomings and they project that onto you. So, don’t deal with it. As the cool kids say: you do you.

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