WWE Chairman Vince McMahon was a recent guest on the Pat McAfee show to discuss all aspects of pro-wrestling, as well as details about his life. One moment saw McMahon discuss his viewpoint on negative feedback, and how hard he tries to focus on the positives and block out criticisms from the media. That and more can be found in the highlights below.
How hard he tries to not focus on the negatives:
I stay out of all of it. I’m not big on the pats on the back. it really screws with your mind. ‘You’re somebody…’ that’s who I am. If you listen to the positives, you have to listen to the negatives. I’m not big on negatives. A negative, no matter what it is, is a double negative. If you’re dealing with a negative, it means you’re not dealing with a positive. You put your intellectual cost in the positive, not the negative. I try and stay away from negatives as much as possible. Members of the media, they’re going to say what they’re going to say. There’s nothing you can do to change it, really. Dealing with a negative…people think you’re an asshole, you can’t change that. ‘No, I’m not really an asshole. I’m really a nice guy.’ ‘Yeah, you’re an asshole.’ ‘Really, I’m a good guy, I love my family.’ ‘You’re an asshole.’ You can’t change perception, generally, when you’re a public persona. Don’t bother. It doesn’t bother me. I used to care about what people thought about me. I care about what the general public thinks of me, as far as the business is concerned, if people think I’m an asshole, congratulations, I guess I am.
How he tried early on to change people’s perception of him:
It took a while. When you’re first starting out and giving it everything you possibly can and doing it for the right reasons and people start knocking you and calling you something you’re not, it bothers you at first. You try and correct it. You realize, ‘this is not going to work.’ I’m spending a lot of time trying to correct this poor image of me and not spending time over here and things I can do from a positive standpoint. You really do have to give it up. Not just a little bit, you really just can’t care what members of the media or people who don’t understand you or have an opinion no matter what. You just can’t care.
(H/T and transcribed by Fightful
)