Public Opinion's Value

Funny how I live my life in the shadow of other’s expectations of me, or, in the light of other’s great opinion of me due to a vast and varying array of personal achievements and or current behavioral attributes.  Either way it is a never ending rhyme of ‘they love me, they love me not.’  Is it important for me to swim/drown in the very fragile, fluctuating pool of public opinion?  Do I need to take on yet another project in order to be redeemable and able to access the accolades that can no doubt be shattered by grouchy dispositions, PMS, or even worse, my own momentary dose of self acceptance?  I recently discovered while I was down with a virus that I am also suffering from exhaustion, self inflicted to be sure. UGH!  I could, but won’t tell you the amount of irons I had in the fire all of which I thought at the time were good choices for great causes, never stopping to sincerely ask if it was the right time, because frankly, if it has to do with God it must be the right time.  A friend reminded me yesterday a SS that ten percent of the people do ninety percent of the work, ninety percent of the time.  I thought about that a lot yesterday and decided that I needed to choose the things I do, based on what God wants from me and not based on what people will think of me.  A God led, Jesus said, Spirit fed life.  Does that exclude the matter of public opinion all together?  It excludes public opinion as a means of personal opinion.  In other words, what and how I think of myself has nothing to do with the ever-present moodiness of all other opinions.  A disconnect happens that I was surprised to learn, a disconnect that is painful and disconcerting for me.  Swimming in the pool of pubic opinion made me completely at the mercy of ‘dysfunction’ and unmanageable circumstances and for what reason?  For a few brief moments, I could somehow muster some semblance of personal acceptance and or worth?  I only want to please you God and in doing so, carve out an existence for me and my children that someday, any day, I might hear You say Lord, thank you for using what I gave you in a positive way.  Now that’s an opinion I care about.