Don’t Get Butt Hurt: The Driven Entrepreneur’s Guide to Not Taking the Bait

“Your nervous system doesn’t care how high you climb. It cares if you feel safe while you’re there.” Rita Castillo-Salese

So You Took It Personally (Same.)

When was the last time someone’s words, or even their silence, sent a jolt through your whole body? You didn’t just think your way into that reaction. You felt it. Your jaw tightened. Your stomach dropped. Your breath went shallow. That’s not weakness. That’s your nervous system doing exactly what it was designed to do.

Taking things personally is one of the most common and quietly destructive mindset traps I see, especially in purpose-driven people. Not because they’re fragile, but because they care, and somewhere along the way, that caring became wired to “threat”. The body learned to brace. To protect. To react before the mind even caught up.

I’ll be honest with you: this was my MO for years. Constructive feedback felt like an attack. A missed invitation felt like rejection. Someone’s resting face? Clearly, it was about me. (It was never about me.) And every time I reacted defensively, I walked away smaller than I was before, and I’m not very tall anyway. 

Butt-Hurt in a Blazer

Here’s the version nobody talks about, the tough one. The one who rolls their eyes at this topic and says, “I don’t take things personally.” Except they go silent in meetings when they feel slighted. Or they get a little cold. Or the jaw sets just so. That’s not unbothered, that’s butt hurt in a blazer. The body doesn’t lie, even when the ego does.

In today’s issue, I’m going to call out the dangers of taking things personally (don’t get butt-hurt about it), show you what it’s costing you in your body, and give you 3 somatic keys to break free from this pattern…finally.

Why Taking Things Personally Is Quietly Wrecking You

1. It Hijacks Your Nervous System

Taking things personally isn’t just a mental habit; it’s a full-body event. The moment you feel slighted, criticized, or excluded, your brain fires a threat response. Cortisol spikes. Muscles brace. Your prefrontal cortex, your brain’s CEO, responsible for clear judgment, goes offline.

You’re no longer responding from your wisest self. You’re responding from survival. 

2. It Erodes Self-Worth and Steals Your Power

When you habitually take things personally, you unconsciously hand your power to other people’s words and actions. You begin to see yourself through the lens of every slight and criticism. Your self-worth becomes a moving target dependent on how others treat you.

And here’s the somatic truth: that erosion lives in the body. The slumped posture. The tight throat. The chest that never fully opens. The body holds the score of every time you make yourself smaller.

3 Somatic Keys to Stop Taking Things Personally

1. Feel It Before You Interpret It

The next time you feel triggered, don’t go straight to the narrative. Go to the sensation first. Where do you feel it in your body? Chest? Throat? Gut? Get curious instead of reactive.

Take one slow, deliberate breath, not to dismiss what happened, but to give your nervous system a moment to downregulate before your mind starts building its case. This pause is not passivity. It is power. I call this your Power Pause.

2. Check the Story You’re Telling Yourself

Once your body has a moment to settle, ask yourself: “What story am I telling myself right now?” Chances are, it’s a fabricated or exaggerated narrative that your threat-activated brain invented to protect you. Look for truth. 

Is there actual truth in what happened, or are you projecting? Is there a lesson worth holding onto? 

Practice discernment from a regulated body, not a reactive one.

3. Expand Your Window of Tolerance

The goal isn’t to become bulletproof. It’s to widen the space between stimulus and response so that you can choose your reaction instead of being hijacked by it.

Each time you pause, breathe, and respond from a grounded place rather than a defensive one, you are literally rewiring your nervous system. You are building a body and mind that can hold more without losing itself.

This is what clutch leadership feels like in your body.

Anyone can react.
Few can regulate. 

The difference changes everything.

Which of these 3 somatic keys do you need most right now? And where in your body do you feel it when you take something personally? Email me at: ritahudgens@gmail.com and tell me. I read every response, and I promise not to take anything personally. ☺

Stay courageous. Stay embodied.

In Optimism,

Rita