Be effective rather than popular

Today I found that I actually care a lot about others' perception of my actions.
And a lot of times, this leads to me being less effective.

I used to think I care more about what's effective than popular. But when I go to
the gym, I noticed that I would only start doing a certain action after I see someone
else doing it. Otherwise, I seem to be afraid of doing it wrong. This is evidence of
me caring more about what's popular than what is effective.

This is bad because almost all the time, I overestimate others' attention on me.
The scientific term for this is the spotlight effect. 99% of the time, others don't
care about my actions at all. So it's far more important for me to think about
what's effective and focus on that rather than what I believe will result in less
judgment from others.