Put your faith in what you see, not what you hear. We have these miraculous brains and eyes yet we fail to use them because we just believe what we hear.
Believe in your experience. This is what your world is about. Your experience! Don’t like a movie but it’s critically acclaimed? Then YOU don’t like the movie, that’s correct. That’s your experience of the world. None of this is one reality. Reality is not an absolute. It’s subjective based on the viewer, that’s you! Believe what you see and don’t doubt yourself.
Believe in what your friends, family, colleagues and partner do. Watch what they do and believe in that. Not what they say. Hopefully the two match up. They say they care about bettering themselves but spend the majority of time watching Netflix? Well then they clearly value Netflix more.
They say if you want to see what a person really cares about, look at their bank account and where they spend their money. You really love your kids but you spend all your money at the pub or on a car? What tells a more accurate story?
Like anything, use a multitude of resources to develop a full overview of what you’re dealing with and adjust your course accordingly.
This doesn’t just apply to other people. Most importantly use these metrics to evaluate what you care about. Where do you spend your money? Where do you spend the majority of your time? Does this line up with what you say you believe?